7 




Class F S^SSf 
Book: 7^5^ L i 
Gopight]^" /f/"7 



CDEmiGHT DEPOSm 



Love and Laughter 



By 

Caroline Edwards Prentiss 

(Mrs. George Hunt Prentiss) 

Author of 
Fleeting Thoughts" and "Sunshine and Shadow" 



G. P. Putnam's Sons 

New York and London 
Zbc Iknlcftcrbocftcr press 

1917 






Copyright, 1917 

BY 

CAROLINE EDWARDS PRENTISS 



M -9 1917 



Ube ftnfclierboclter press, flew K?otlt 



- \ 



Dc&fcateD 

TO 

MY HUSBAND 

GEORGE HUNT PRENTISS 



The writer wishes to thank those friends who 
have helped her by their criticism, comment, 
and suggestion. 















PAGE 


Love and Laughter i 


How Choose . 










2 


Morn, Noon, Night . 












3 


Morning . 












4 


Immortality 












5 


Night 












6 


The Everlasting 












7 


Playthings 












8 


Thought . 












9 


Nevertheless . 












10 


The Soul . 












11 


He Sleeps 












12 


A Petition 












13 


A Woman's Part 












14 


Popularity 












15 


To my Sweetheart 












. i6 


Faithlessness . 












. 17 


Experience 












. I8 


Why? 












. 19 


As of Old 












20 


Peace 












22 



vu 



viii Contents 








PAGE 


Fulfilment .23 


Disappointment 










24 


The Utmost 










25 


Who can Tell? 










26 


Two Pearls 










27 


Little to Little 






• 




28 


Atonement 










29 


War 










30 


The Diplomat . 










31 


Love's Secret . " 










32 


Vanity 










33 


What is Sleep? 










34 


Love-Song 










35 


The Play . 










36 


Bird-Song. 










37 


Fortune . 










38 


Just a Rift 










. 39 


To A Friend . 










. 40 


Wounded . 










42 


Temptation 










. 43 


The Ruby 










. 44 


The Hypocrite 










45 


In Love to make Amends 










. 46 


Happiness 










47 


A Vagabond 










. 48 



Contents 






ix 


PAGB 


A Pilgrim 49 


The Factory Girl . 










50 


Sculpture 










51 


Age .... 










52 


Moods 










54 


Anger 










55 


Youth and Age 










56 


Halfway . 










57 


Joy ... . 










58 


My Book . 










59 


Imagination 










60 


December 










61 


Just Tears and Tears 










62 


Near to Sleep 










63 


Some Days 










64 


Sleep 










65 


The Circus 










66 


Longing . 










67 


My Baby . 










68 


Music 










70 


A Penitent 










71 


The Mermaid . 










72 


She Loves Me 










. 74 


Memory's Moods 










. 75 


Time 










.76 



X Contents 








PAGE 

Unpraised . 77 


My Muse . 












. 78 


The Poet . 












79 


Bells and Bells 












8i 


Priscilla . 












82 


In and Out 












• 83 


Retold 












. 84 


Expiation 












. 85 


Be True . 












. 86 


Lost Fancies . 












. 87 


Tradition 












8S 


Just One . 












89 


Poverty and Wealth 












90 


Enough for Me 












91 


Hope and Fear 












92 


Marjorie Sweet 












93 


The Shadow 












94 


Undercurrents 












95 


Too Dear 












96 


Make-Believe . 












97 


Power 












98 


The Artist 












99 


Sweetheart 












100 


The Blind 












lOI 


The Fruitful Hour . 












102 



Contents 






xi 


PAGB 


The Deaf Mute 103 


The Song Writer 












104 


Over All . 












105 


Compensation . 












106 


Love Awakes . 












107 


Conquest 












108 


The Unseeing . 












109 


Loneliness 












no 


If only in a Dream 










III 


Sunshine's Morrow 










112 


Sudden Music . 










113 


Forgotten Hours 












114 


The Diamond . 












115 


In Lonely State 












116 


In a Golden Hour 












117 


Sweet Music . 












118 


Drifting . 












119 


Defeat 












120 


Fair Mistress . 












121 


Like Butterflies 












122 


Hearts for Sale 












123 


The Automobile 












124 


Fickle Fortune 












125 


The Dreamer . 












126 


Love and I 












127 



Xll 



Contents 



The Jester 

Unfulfilled 

How I Have Loved 

Sleep On . 

Safety-Land 

Death 

The Waltz 

You Who Have Failed Me 

Love's Heart of Rose 

My Heart's Sweet Flower 

Vision .... 

Love's Day 

My Heart's Desire 

Mere Memories 

Just Then 

On the Uphill Road 

A Grey Day 

Frivolous Betty 

Cupid .... 

The Master Musician 

Sleeping Night 

Love's Share . 

Life .... 

My Grandfather's Clock 

Warfare .... 



PAGE 

128 
129 

130 
131 
132 
134 
135 
136 
137 
138 
139 
140 
141 
142 

143 
144 
146 

147 
148 
149 
150 
151 
152 
153 
155 



Contents 






xiii 


PAGE 


Farewell 156 


The Coquette . 








. 157 


Today and Tomorrow 








. 158 


An Afternoon Tea . 








. 159 


Lock and Key . 








. 161 


Of Scanty Erudition 








. 162 


The Old Actor 








. 164 


From the Ages to the Now 








. 165 


Wayfarers 








. 166 


Dear Love 








. 167 


Life's Trinity . 








168 


Rather to Storms . 








169 


Great Heart . 








170 


New Life 








171 


Insomnia .... 








172 


A Sunbeam to the Fern . 








^72> 


Snowflakes 








174 


The Opal .... 








175 


Echoes 








176 


Wedded .... 








177 


Soul and Song 








178 


Phosphorescence 








179 


Transfigured .... 








180 


The Sea 








181 


A Broken Promise . 








182 



XIV Contents 








PAGB 


Vistas .183 


The Stars 








. 184 


The Garden of Death 








. 185 


The World Runs Away . 








. 186 


God's Lullaby 








187 


The Princess of Summer . 








. 188 


Rivers and Robins . 








. 189 


Where Sweet is Rest 








. 190 


Nature's Melodies . 








. 192 


Nature's Best 








. 193 


The June Rain. 








. 194 


A Bird out of the Nest . 








195 


The Rain .... 








196 


The Moon 








197 


Glad Heart of Me . 








198 


Wanton Weather 








199 


Earth Changed to Paradise 








200 


Nature .... 








201 


Yearning .... 








202 


Almost .... 








203 


Early Morning 








204 


Betrayed .... 








205 


Dancing 








206 


Birds 








208 


Masquerading .... 








209 



Contents xv 

PAGE 

The Nightingale 210 

The Peacock . . . . . . .211 

Fallen Leaves 212 

Wanted 213 

The Cloud 214 

The Willows 215 

Blossom-Suitors . . . . . .216 

The Heart of the World . . . .217 

The Rainbow .218 

Heat Lightning 219 

In Arcadie 220 

Song to a Song 221 

Everywhere and Nowhere .... 222 

Sweet Silences ...... 223 

The Brook ....... 224 

Spirits of the Woodlands .... 225 

Wanderlust . . . . . . . 227 

The Seraph 228 

The World's Echo ...... 229 

All Tremulous with Tears .... 230 

Fascinating Fannie 231 

Nature 232 

Drifts and Drifts ...... 233 

Dewdrops 234 

The Cardinal Bird 235 



xvi Contents 






PAGE 


Waiting . . 236 


The Mountain Stream 






. 237 


The Forest 






. 238 


The Earth 






. 239 


The Early Dawn to the Sun 






. 240 


The Buried Volcano 






. 241 


When Spring Comes 






. 242 


Early April 






. 243 


Spring's Incense 








. 244 


April 








. 245 


June Days 








. 246 


Expectancy 








. 247 


March 








. . 248 


May to June . 








• 249 


Spring's Jewels 








• 250 


Midwinter 








. 251 


Dear Midsummer 








. 252 


Summer Days . 








. 253 


The Old, Old Story 








. 254 


August 








• 255 


Spring is Here 








. 256 


The Rain of May 








. 257 


A June Song . 








. 258 


The Leaf to the Tree . 






. 259 


Autumn's Artistry . 


. 






. 260 



Contents 



xvu 



Spring 

The North Wind 

The East Wind 

The South Wind 

The West Wind 

A Compassionate Lover 

The Tempest . 

Where the Wind Blows 

The Song of the Winds 

My Lady Daffodil . 

The Edelweiss. 

Love-in-the-Mist 

The Violet 

Who Knows? . 

The Scarlet Geranium 

Clovers . 

The Pipsissewa. 

The Bluebell . 

The Tulip 

The South Wind to the Violet 

Dandelions 

May and the Lily-of-the- Valley 

The June Day Rosebud 

The Water Lily 

Pansies 



PAGE 
261 

262 

263 

264 

265 

266 

267 

268 

269 

270 

271 

272 

273 
274 

275 
276 
277 
278 
279 
280 
281 
282 
283 
284 
285 



xviii Contents 






PAGE 


When Roses Bloom 286 


Cherry Blossoms 






. 287 


Early Arbutus 






. 288 


Roses .... 






. 289 


Pussy Willows 






. 290 


The Daffodil and the Bee 






. 291 


The Primrose . 






. 292 


For Love it Grew . 






• 293 


Rose of the Glad Time . 






• 294 



Love and Laughter 



Love and Laughter 

To lengthen days but lengthen laughter, 
Flowery ways must come thereafter. 

Lest a man the good be losing, 
Laughter let him then be choosing. 

Choosing laughter, choose the flowers 
That, thereafter, grace man's hours. 

Lengthen days and lengthen laughter, 
Joy and love shall come thereafter. 

Let us then choose Life to love us, 
Joy and laughter, love to move us. 

Choosing joy and love and laughter. 
Flowery days must come thereafter. 



HOW CHOOSE 

If I may only choose one song 

How could I choose? 

How learn to lose 
The song whose urge is overstrong ? 

I cannot choose 

The songs to lose. 
Yet those I sing I may sing wrong; 

I cannot choose 

So will not lose 
The songs that once to me belong. 



MORN, NOON, NIGHT 

Morn, noon, night. 

Love, death, might, 
From these few notes the poets fashion 

As many tunes as tears, 

Music to melt heart-fears 
And lilting songs that swell to passion. 



MORNING 

Into the open come I 

Cleaving the sleepy, sad air, 
Come laden with dewbuds and balsam 

(God fashions the burden fair) . 
I come from the stars, from enchantment, 

The glad flower-land all my own, 
The foam-beds and forests possessing. 

The summitless heaven my throne. 

Into the open come I 

To exult, though disaster my goal; 
Through perils, my breast bared to toiling, 

The child in my veins, in my soul, 
I come from the stars, from enchantment, 

Dropping fire and a glory the same, 
The fire like gold on a pearl drop. 

The heart of its whiteness aflame. 

Into the open come I 

And the gods, breathing beauty on me, 
Wake my heart-strings to tenderest music, 

Like bird songs but sweeter, more free; 
I come from the stars, from enchantment, 

There is joy in the beat of my wings. 
My lips none too mute, none too singing, 

I am king of the sun-nourished kings. 



IMMORTALITY 

Out of the infinite, helpless we come ; 

Into the infinite go worn and dumb. 

Shackled is joy, is vision, is ruth. 

But safe in the travail is pain-quickened truth. 



NIGHT 

Into the open come I, 

My eyes keeping fear well at bay : 
Not bruising the weak with my footsteps 

I stifle all cries, still all play. 
In my zeal deathless fires o'erleaping, 

Creeping under all earth-clinging bars, 
I come and imperial the journey. 

Come far from the dim, distant stars. 

Into the open come I, 

From years and their cycles of pain, 
I come, bearing spoils from God's Kingdom, 

Exaltation and pity the twain. 
Where, oh, where, shall I lay them down gently 

These holiest holies so white, 
A touch unrevering would stain them, 

Where's the bed for their crystalline light? 

Into the open come I, 

A prophet with prophecy thrilled, 
Seeking mystery in life's domination. 

The passion of dreams new-fulfilled. 
I'm peace to pale souls self -condemning. 

To sufferers a heaven-sent shield, 
My majesty comes of God's giving, 

Crowned by Him to no earth king I yield. 



THE EVERLASTING 

Quick with agony, a soul 

Sought in Death her distant balm; 
In her grave Death willed her life, 

Sent her forth, reborn in calm. 



PLAYTHINGS 

I pawned the playthings of an hour, 
And with their price I sought to buy 

The mystery of unearned power; 
I paid the price, not asking why 

The conquest of myself begun 

Was but a dream — a dream half done. 

I learned too late that I must pawn 
The playthings of a life for gain 

(No single hour of love withdrawn) . 
The payments made, the price of pain 

The conquest of myself — a dream 

Of power fulfilled — the dream supreme. 



THOUGHT 

Thought smiles on me, I smile on him, 
We marry, heart-to-heart elate; 

I the servant, he my king, 
Elysium my new estate. 



NEVERTHELESS 

There*s a smile in the day, 
Love's refrain in my heart, 

When the tender winds play 
Till the rose leaves unpart. 

There's a tear in the day 

For Love's heart-beat is cold, 

Still the tender winds play 
And the rose leaves unfold. 



lo 



THE SOUL 

An echo rings from shore to shore 
GirdHng the sleepless sea, 

Winging through the mist to soar 
Upward, onward, fast and free, 
To its goal Eternity. 



II 



HE SLEEPS 

His wonder-dreams betray 
Where song is, where is breath; 
Alike they Hfe reveal, 
Where shallows are, where deeps. 

His sovereign dreams allay 
Hurt miseries, even death; 
Yet on his lips a seal, 
The secret his, he sleeps. 



A PETITION 

Give me something born of Wisdom, 
Perfect to breathe with every breath; 

Something to make Life's bitter heartaches 
Sweet for ages, sweet in Death. 



13 



A WOMAN'S PART 

Her two small hands must Pain uphold, 
Must mould 
The cruel thing into a grace, 

Whose face 
Is ever fair and unafraid. 

Her longing eyes must gather Peace, 

Must cease 
To hold Regret a prisoner there, 

A prayer 
The only yearning plea betrayed. 

Her heart must Memory possess, 

No less 
Than Love's in death and make no sign; 

Divine 
To hide dread sorrow in its birth. 

Her soul must waft to heaven, there lay 

Away, 
Within its brooding nest, delight. 

The might 
Born of her endless faith on earth. 



14 



POPULARITY 

Sweet-pampered by the gaping universe, 
A kingdom and a crown your fatal lot, 

For as the fickle Fates their loves reverse, 
New Sovereigns seek, your fame is soon forgot. 



TO MY SWEETHEART 

I send to you, my Sweetheart, 
This Hly bud whose face 
Betokens naught but grace. 

For you alone, my Sweetheart, 

Whose smiling eyes speak true, 
For you alone it grew. 



FAITHLESSNESS 

Aye! his the art 
To mould her heart 
As he might with the skill of a master, 

Who magically chisels a block 
Just to build of his fancy Love's statue, 
Whose fingers with Death's interlock. 



17 



EXPERIENCE 

Seeking knowledge I met Love 

And reading from his page knew Pain ; 

Seeking Love I Knowledge found, 

Then Wisdom was the heart-won gain. 

And now, so wise have I become, 
That old-time teachers teach me not. 

In turn my learning I impart, 

My heart-won Knowledge not forgot. 



i8 



WHY? 

Between the mist and mist, the sky 

Mutely holds Tomorrow fast. 
Make war, the loving arms defy ! 

Steal, if this the power thou hast : 
Seize Tomorrow — then ask why 

Thou would'st know one hour's forecast. 



19 



AS OF OLD 

A Sunray in far travel 
Alights upon my desk, 

Then glides o'er hieroglyphics 
That wander, half grotesque, 

Upon the moon-white pages 
Like some old arabesque. 



And there, as if to shame me, 

The spirit over-bold, 
Abides and peering curious 

(When leaves on leaves unfold 
Of poesy denuded) 

Pierces it to the core. 
And sees that in my anguish 

I sing not as of yore. 



Oh! Sunray, child of Heaven, 
Wrought of the summer's gold, 

What know you of heart-hunger. 
Of earth's enslaving cold? 

How know that if soul-famished, 
I sing not as of old? 

20 



As of Old 21 

But, Sunray, once you touch me 

And hold me in your heart, 
Sweet lyrics I'll be singing. 

Soul-hunger lost in part. 
Then if you'll scan my pages 

There poesy you'll see, 
And then love's rose and silver 

Will tint life's day for me. 



PEACE 

When you beckon Life's horizon near, 
So near it comes caressing you, 

Then find your overlook all clear, 
The hallowed rest of Christ in view. 



22 



FULFILMENT 

Can aught but a white-souled lily 

Uncover her heart at will? 
Yield sweets to her butterfly lover 

Who, coveted bliss to fulfil, 
Is at rest 
On her breast 
(The breast of the white- winged lily), 

Whose bidding 'tis joy to obey: 
The lily, earth's loveliest blossom. 

The queen of midsummer's long day. 

Yea — so doth a pure-eyed maiden 

Uncover her heart to one, 
Who, waiting her, will and adoring, 

His ecstasy sweet begun. 
Is at rest 
On her breast, 
The breast of the soft-lipped maiden, 

Whose bidding 'tis joy to obey: 
The maiden whose gladsome white spirit 

Smiles as the sun smiles on day. 



23 



DISAPPOINTMENT 

When you lure the sunbeams to your lair, 
Whereby is Summer held, then find 

That shadows hang a curtain there, 
With Winter threatening behind. 



24 



THE UTMOST 

A sigh, a frown, a fear, 

Thus Hfe to Hfe must speak; 

A smile, a sob, a tear, 

Thus souls each other seek. 

A wish, a cry, a glance, 
And feeble is life's tongue; 

A thought, a kiss, a trance, 
And soul's desire is sung. 



^5 



WHO CAN TELL? 

Who can see 
In the winter a gleam 
Of the summer's warm glow? 

Can there be, 
From long sleep, a light dream? 

Who can know? 

Who can tell 
How calm wakens from strife, 
How a soul-cry out-rings 

Pain to quell? 
How a life to a life 

Sobs or sings? 



26 



TWO PEARLS 

I found two pearls upon the sand. 

One like a fallen star, 
But lit the common underworld, 

There gleaming on the bar. 

And one lay closer to the tide 
Where sea-foam touched its face; 

Its little tender gleam lay dead, 
Smothered its yearning grace. 

Then on the shore I found two souls. 

One held the torch of fame, 
Lifting its hopeful fire afar, 

As star to star its flame. 

And one went over to the brink 
Of murmuring waters, where 

Life's waves o'erwhelmed its feeble light, 
Unsaved by grace or prayer. 



27 



LITTLE TO LITTLE 

If little to little be wedded, 

There's a ponderous hill part begun 
And when built by the brawny ungrateful 

Its peak may uplift to the sun. 



28 



ATONEMENT 

A twig, and lo the leaves show fair, 
In the dread, the hitherto unknown. 

The first-born of the spring, they came. 
For the dark of winter to atone. 

A life, and lo, new grace is here. 

In unguessed, unsought, fruitful ways, 

The first-born of the soul to be, 
Glad love atoning for dead days. 



29 



WAR 

Oh War, 

I may 
Not wean you from the lust of gore, 

Nor stay 
The treachery that long endures 

And lures 
Into your soul-destroying lair 
The buoyant young — the ever fair. 

Oh War, 

Unslain 
You are, through poisoned days and more, 

Through pain, 
Through all the devastating years, 

Through tears, 
Though every human ill 
Lay on your heart enough to kill. 

Unslain till women will to pray, 

And leagued against your shameless strife 
Shall conquer all your evil way, 

And kill your brutal, venomed life. 



30 



THE DIPLOMAT 

Deceit is the cloak that a courtier wears long 
As a polished, a baffling pretence, 

Whereunder, protected, he canny and strong, 
It with smiles but beguiling your sense. 



31 



LOVE'S SECRET 

Perhaps the silent eyes, the lair 
May be the lips love-fraught, 

Or else a silken tress the snare 
Wherein my heart is caught. 

Perhaps my instant weal or woe 

Is held within a glance. 
How learn the secret I would know, 

If love be snared by fate or chance? 



32 



VANITY 

Come, place your hand in mine 

My Vanity and let 
Me there your seal confine, 

Till chance, I may forget 
The burdens you ne'er cease 
To lay upon my peace. 

So Vanity, I hold 

Your mighty hand in mine, 
Thus if too baneful-bold 

I sooner may divine 
Your evils, quicker kill 
Them ere they slay my will. 



33 



WHAT IS SLEEP? 

Is sleep the heart's contentment, 
Day's memories there subdued ? 

Is a dream the changed or changeless, 
Is it self in self renewed? 

Is sleep the ringing foretime, 
Whose world is unexplored? 

Is a dream life's finished glory, 
Love's promise therein stored? 

Is sleep a boundless harbour, 

Is a dream its silent sea? 
The sea whereon if sailing, 

Sails the soul to Destiny? 



34 



LOVE-SONG 

Of Harmonies the purest 

One little tune I hear, 
That, with the south-wind floating, 

Is wondrous glad and clear. 

It trembles ere alighting, 

Then, choosing me, comes near, 
Enters my heart to fill it, 

Displacing dread and fear. 



35 



THE PLAY 

Waiting for the curtain's rise, 

To show the quick and mimic play, 

Side by side sit sinners, saints, 
The unpaid actors, who betray 

As many moods as men are there, 

Moods dark as night, moods heavenly fair. 

Suddenly the stage is gay 

With actors working for a wage, 

Joy and sorrow they betray, 
Painted youth and painted age; 

Laughing, dancing, great the glee, 

Saints or sinners they can be . 

Puppets either way they play. 
Paid or unpaid actors they. 
Hither, thither, they must run 
As the race was first begun; 

Laughing, dancing swift or slow, 

Lawful, lawless on they go. 

Saints or sinners, they forget 

That they must pay God's unpaid debt. 



Z^ 



BIRD-SONG 

The poet harks to the bird-song, 

The plaint and the pleading to part ; 

The lover but hears in the trilling 
The cry of the human heart. 

Am I lover or poet that bird-songs 
Sing a paean — and only to me, 

Just a note that no other soul heareth 
Till my heart again sings it to thee? 



37 



FORTUNE 

Your quiverful of frowns or favors 
Holds gifts of rosy summer time, 

Promises that heavenward open 
If, in love, they wake sublime. 

Fair destinies you keep in hiding 
When smiles your sunny heritage; 

Sudden sleep for men in anguish. 
Resignation held for age. 

Your kindness lost in jealous angers, 
You kill with overvenomed darts. 

Cruelly shooting poisoned arrows. 
Stabbing beauty, stabbing hearts. 

Slaves are we to your caprices 

And targets for your piercing aim, 

We play Life's game without its hazard; 
Freedom's but an empty name. 



38 



JUST A RIFT 

Just a halt in the world's wildest hiirry, 
As with Silence Death sets his long seal. 

Just a rift in expectant far-Heaven, 
As mourning our loved ones we kneel. 

Just a hush falling over the angels, 
As the rift of the sk}^ closes in, 

Just a sigh of benignant, sweet mercy, 
As they welcome souls severed from sin. 



39 



TO A FRIEND 

The Greetings oj Long-Ago 

Tonight we have come 

Out of the silent shadow-land 

And out of the long-ago ; 
Dreaming the dreams we used to dream, 

The mystery of Life to know — 

As in days of long-ago ! 



Tonight we have come 

In robes soft-woven of white and gold 

And fashions of long-ago ; 
In garb that maids were fain to wear 

When Love was yearning, life aglow, — 

As in days of long-ago ! 



Tonight we have come. 

To bring from a dear and vanished hand 

The clasp of a long-ago, 
Yet love-light pales when life-dreams seem 

But Fame that happy fates bestow — 

As in days of long-ago ! 
40 



To a Friend 41 

Tonight we have come, 

Through shadows dim that now unfold, 

Revealing the long-ago ; 
To greet fair youth who, free, may care 

For Life, Love and Fame. — Be it so, — 

The greetings of long-ago. 



WOUNDED 

Curling over to the stem 

A rose-leaf met a cruel thorn. 
Stabbed — the petal shed her tears, — 

Thus of ruddy beauty shorn. 

And so my heart was pierced through 
By faithlessness, whose sharpened dart 

Stung fierce and deep to hurt, not kill. 
But my soul fell fainting from the smart. 



42 



TEMPTATION 

Cross swords with me, the fight is long, 
Find me glad and find me strong. 

Love's fairest flowers offer me, 
Inward glories let me see. 

Hold a victory near my hand, 
Imprisoned, show me freedom's land, 

Cross swords with me, the fight be long. 
Find me glad and find me strong. 



43 



THE RUBY 

The blood of Life's warfare imbibing, 
In your veins the red rivers swift roll. 

A mirror, you image Love's wonder 
And the fervours consuming its soul. 

Insatiate your eye is reflecting 

The desire that is Love's — his alone — 

*Tis fire to fire eternal, 
Less immortal your heart than my own. 



44 



THE HYPOCRITE 

"I'm not as other sinners are," 

The wily hypocrite soft said, 
Friends thought him over good to die, 

And yet he lay among the dead. 

Then spectres from his past arose. 

Rough hands despoiled him of his fame ; 

Once loving him none loved him then. 
His life despised, his name a shame. 



45 



IN LOVE TO MAKE AMENDS 

After his death they go away, 

These friends who bid me, kneeling, pray 

To ask my God to hold my heart 

Unbreaking, while the sting and smart 

Of Sorrow hirrt me sore, 

Bruising me more on more. 

They go away, well satisfied, 
While I, heart-hunger once denied, 
I ask of Grief the reason why 
I must bear pain with no outcry. 
I pray as men have prayed, 
"God keep me unafraid." 

These friends, they love me true and. yet 
Compassionate, they must forget ; 
While I must fight my fight and ask 
My God to help me in the task, 
Blending with tears my plaint. 
My tortured heart beats faint. 

At last there comes a new-bom day. 
When sunshine seems with me to stay 
And change my darkest day to light. 
God has altered pain to might. 
Now come to me, my friends, 
In love, 111 make amends. 



46 



HAPPINESS 

Within four walls I know a fair, 
If little, world of dazzling light, 

For true love came and settled there ; 
'Twas Happiness dark could not blight. 



47 



A VAGABOND 

A vagabond, of race I'm proud, 
As proud as any king might be; 

A king has treasures I have not. 
Yet he's a slave, while I am free. 

Kingdoms bought in blood has he, 
Gold and subjects at his call, 

A queen to kneel at his command, 
Yet, sceptred, still is he in thrall. 

His jewelled crown bears heavily. 
No heart is his that he holds true; 

His soul is under lock and key, 
His intimates are false and few. 

While I can count the world my own, 
Every hearth a friendly place, 

A love for asking I can find, 
A light in every nameless face. 

The golden sun my treasure is. 
My million subjects everywhere. 

The creeping things that warm the trail, 
The flying things that grace the air. 

A vagabond am I — and glad 

That freedom is of life the leaven, 

As proud am I of my estate 

As angels are of theirs in Heaven. 



48 



A PILGRIM 

A pilgrim at the shrine kneels long, 
Begs Destiny to stay its hand; 

Because his worldly heart beats strong 
Looks down, his soul to understand. 

The pilgrim lays away desire, 
His human heart in firm control, 

And by his shrine of flame and fire 
Looks up to realize his soul. 



49 



THE FACTORY GIRL 

Heigho-lack-a-day — 

The overweary maiden sang, 
She must work and never play, 

Work driven by the mill's harsh clang. 

Heigho-lack-a-day — 

The maiden's sudden cry outrang — 
Whipped by factories that flay 

The strongest of the feeble gang. 

Heigho-lack-a-day — 

The anguished cry a shriller twang — 
Falling white — a corpse the prey — 

Buried to the mill's fierce clang. 



50 



SCULPTURE 

This child of mine can mould the smudgy clay 
And spirits of the world there wake alive, 

Called thither at her cry — their hearts in play — 
Or shriven if her magic power can shrive. 

A child of mine, yet spite her mystic ways 
She fails, for spent her powers she could not 
bring 

Life's melodies into her plastic clays, 

Nor fix the song the nightingale doth sing. 

So much to keep eternal, yet her hands. 

No cunning have to mould the heaven's 
white way, 

No colour can she set that Time withstands, 
Nor hold in sight the glories of one day. 



51 



AGE 

Just in my prime, 
One day I met 
A foe called Time. 
In fight he let 
Me cross my sword with his, 
A pretty play! 
. I would defy, 
Yet I obey, 

And "Fool" I cry, 
When Time the Conqueror is. 

I pay to him 

My little all, 
The eyes that dim, 

The rose in thrall 
Once sleeping on my cheek ; 
And he demands 

The tribute of 
My trembling hands, 

And even Love 
Before his glance grows weak. 

Then courage, smiles 
Are feeble, slow; 

No grace beguiles 
Me from my woe. 
52 



Age 53 



I weary of the fight ; 
My fervor slain, 

My sword is his, 
Nothing my gain, 
Each day I wis 
Creeps nearer to the night. 



MOODS 

A lullaby in chanting, 
A shiver of the wind, 

A grief on grief descanting, 
A subtle hurt to find. 

A love astray in longing, 
A loss too quick with pain, 

A faith that dies of wronging, 
A sacrifice in vain. 

A noontime gone to madness, 
A darkness sudden white, 

A lull in sweet soul-sadness, 
A day that blazons light. 

A dream in words unspoken, 
A fancy born in song, 

A silence, long unbroken, — 
These moods to life belong. 



54 



ANGER 

Steeped in petty, paltry passion 
Anger makes a Thing of man, 

Who fashions fate as hammers fashion 
Hot steel, when poor the artisan. 



55 



YOUTH AND AGE 

To youth and age 

May Time presage 
Great gifts, each precious in its way ; 

To youth, Love's dream, 

To age, the gleam 
Of Truth that shall for youth repay. 

To age the kind, 

Assured mind 
That safely holds a hallowed trust ! 

The soul that serves, 

That Love conserves, 
In spite of Fate's estranging thrust. 

To age the true 

Sweet faith, as new - 
As Springtime after winter's cold; 

The tenderness. 

Time's best caress, 
That wraps age around with fold on fold. 



56 



HALFWAY 

Blurring the vision of glad day 

Grief spoils the sweetness of love's hour, 
Strips earth of summer's bud and flower, 

Scattering woes the ragged way. 
Am I a coward that I shrink 
Into his footsteps deep to sink, 

To walk with Grief, my hand in his, 

Over dead bloom, over dead bliss? 

A coward that I love the day 

Full of blossoming and glow, 

Warm with love-light where I go? 
Life bids me walk with Grief halfway, 

Roses in one hand to keep 

And then o'er withered bloom to weep : 
But at last the lips of Life I kiss, 
Grateful to know one hour of bliss. 

The hour that love-light sheds quick rays 
Back more than halfway o'er dead days. 



57 



JOY 

Beginning the day Joy sings triumphantly 
And clad in shining robes of rose and white 
Is winged Youth, 

The heart's delight; 
But twin of ruth 
Soon must his laughing song a wailing be, 

Soon must his shining robes of rose turn grey, 
Changing forsooth 

To show Life's way, 
It's eternal truth, 
That song and laughter, light and all gay things 
Must stifle, sicken, die with drooping wings. 



58 



MY BOOK 

I have a book 

Wherein I look, 
To see if there I find a sign 

Whereof the word 

Is softly heard 
In singing rhymes of line on line. 

And sometimes I 

Can hear a sigh 
That floats between the finished leaves; 

A sob I hear, 

As though a tear 
With gayer melodies inweaves. 

This book is glad, 

Its music mad 
Sings sweet through all my dreaming hours, 

And as it plays 

Through all my days, 
I love its song as earth loves flowers. 



59 



IMAGINATION 

He draws from deeps that have no soundings, 
He gathers grace from heights unknown, 

And drifting onward, seaward, skyward 
Is a king — aloof if not alone. 

The mighty forces nature cradles, 
Are quick or sleeping at his will ; 

And even love he makes life-lasting. 
While youth he holds for ever still. 

And lavishly the easy spendthrift 
Scatters his songs all men among; 

Yet wise is he, his wisdom telling; 
So children read his simple tongue. 

Aye King is he, with endless kingdoms 
Circled with summer's softest air, 

With mystic fancies ever peopled 
These alien lands are ever fair. 



60 



DECEMBER 

Grim and gaunt December stands, 
His haunt the howling wilderness; 

The long, rough way he understands. 
No cooing breeze melts his duress. 

The devastating wind, his pride. 

Although the shivering worlds protest; 

With unforbearing fiends allied 
He only is content — at rest. 



6i 



JUST TEARS AND TEARS 

His heart is stilled and yet I wait 

Listening for speech — long lost in sleep; 

I search his eyes for light again, 
Not finding what I want — I weep. 

Just tears and tears and who shall weigh 
My grief by such a sign as this ? 

But watching you could see my pain 
When his cold lips refuse my kiss. 

Just tears and tears the long day through, 
'Tis ever so the sad heart cries. 

But oh, for one small moment when 
I could but see his paradise. 

If my hurt soul could follow his, 

To reach his Heaven where no one weeps. 
My tears and tears would fewer be — 

I'd know God's peace that never sleeps. 



62 



NEAR TO SLEEP 

When cradled by a cloud I swing 
(The soft and wavering winds a-wing 

To chant my lullabies) 

I swing to wayward skies, 
Where crimson tints betray the day — 
Where moonbeams silver half the way. 

And swung a-nigh to shadow lands, 
Sleep's hushed encroachment I withstand 

To linger there a while 

With the purpling sun's last smile. 
But while I'm brooding over this, 
I jdeld to night's endearing kiss. 



63 



SOME DAYS 

Some days are but the haunting ghosts 
Of yesterdays I would forget ; 

Possessing me, they come with hosts 
Of wrongs deep weighted with regret. 

And then some days I fain recall 
The subtle honied words that calm, 

The mystic things that seemed life's all, 
Things eloquent of heart-sweet balm. 

The dear enduring things that come 
Proclaiming light, though it be dark; 

Of yesterdays this magic sun 

Lays hand on me its might to mark. 

Then some days I but see the sun 
Shining its way where'er I glance. 

There I see Love not dead but won, 
Beginning with me my life's romance. 



64 



SLEEP 

In silent and far sliadowland, 
I feel a soft, compelling hand 

Close over me, 

So I can be 
No wanderer and fly away, 
Back in the world of men to stay. 

So languorous and strange the place, 
Whose dark has yet a tender face. 

That there I bide, 

The distant wide, 
Soft shadowland my restful bed, 
The dark wherein love's dreams are bred. 



65 



THE CIRCUS 

There merry men are valiant ones, 
Brave women dally long with life ; 

A husband in the daring play 
Flings danger to his willing wife. 

And early as the child can spell 

Is self-control his alphabet ; 
His hand must guide, must brutes command, 

His feet must not their tricks forget. 

He must essay new winged flights 

And from the canvas heaven look down. 

Look down upon the gaping crowd 
To win his laurel wreath, his crown. 

One awful moment as he falls, 

The moans of many men arise. 
His mother's courage in his soul, 

He wins God's Heaven as his prize. 

There merry men are valiant ones; 

With hearts of horror, aping fun, 
They hazard lives as though in play — 

No chance to weep, the game begun. 



66 



LONGING 

Dear heart of mine, I want you madly 
While my untired eyes are bright, 

I want you when the hours drag sadly, 
When, sightless, all my day is night. 

I want you when you're worn and weeping 
And when your changing mood is gay, 

I want you, dear, my heart in keeping, 
To be my seeing eyes, my day. 



67 



MY BABY 

'Twas after many days, when I had been 
Near shadow land, so weak I wept, 

And waking to this world of din, 
They told me that my baby slept, 
The sleep that long its silence kept. 

And why 
Should I 
Be left, 
■ Bereft 
Of all my aching heart had craved ? 
Just I, who from my starved life 
My hungry soul for her had saved. 
Just I, who learned man's love from strife, 
Not e'en in name a lawful wife. 

A wife, 
A Hfe, 
And then, 
Again 
The baby spirit passing by 

E'er I had heard its first-born wail, ] 
Its faint and fitful mother-cry ; 
For such a joy all others pale; 
When I so wanted this, why fail? 
68 



My Baby 69 



Ah me, 
To be 
Alive, 
To shrive 
Myself of sin and make me true 

Is all I ask of Heaven, just this: 
To make my woman's soul anew, 
That I may reach my utmost bliss, 
The guerdon of my baby's kiss. 



MUSIC 

Men search the peopled ways for song 
Whose soul is summoned from the sea, 

Whose fire is earth's, in flame outburst. 
Whose sweet desire is m.elody, 

For song with no discordant note 
Of life's long moan and agony; 

For heart-songs with the tender tunes 
To tame untamed humanity, 

For song whose chant is low to please 
The child untaught in minstrelsy, 

The toiler worn with age too soon, 
The sick who pay pain's penalty. 

But saints who haunt the heavens for song, 
Hear pure, unbroken harmony. 

Which human lips, in worship, sing 
In sacramental ecstasy. 



70 



A PENITENT 

Conquering sleep lays lips on mine, 
Lays on my heart its light caress, 

And I, I worship at its shrine, 
A penitent, my sins confess. 

Then Sleep betrays not as I fear, 
And ne'er a penance doth impose: 

But, as a saviour, holds me dear 

And stills my quaking, quick heart-throes. 



71 



THE MERMAID 

Skimming close to the face of the ruffled blue 
sea, 

Can a mermaid the raindroppings hear? 
Can she fancy the blossoming daisy-white lea, 

Or the glow of the still-fading year ? 

Can she hear, sinking lower, song-sirens that 
charm. 
As they fly through the pink coral deeps ? 
Of what measure the loves that her heart -fears 
disarm ? 
What the dreams that arise when she sleeps? 

Has she fellows to follow, a hand in her hand? 

Is her firmament lit with a star? 
Wakes a moon, or a sun, at her whispered com- 
mand? 

Does she ride in a dragon-drawn car? 

Is her garment of rose with a silvery sheen. 

Does her hair fall in pale golden curls ? 
And in gathering treasure, what gems can she 
glean 
For her crown, over-broidered with pearls? 
72 



The Mermaid 73 

Buried under the restless, the murmuring blue 
sea, 

Is she dancing, her grief to dispel? 
Is there somewhere a place, a fair heaven to be? 

Has the mermaid a soul, who can tell? 



SHE LOVES ME 

In the gloaming have you listened 
To the patter of the rain ? 

Have you heard it soft-repeating, 
Just a laughing, light refrain? 

In a murmur, swift-surprising. 
Have you ever heard it tell, 

Of the jealous-guarded secrets 
Of the sky from which it fell ? 

In the gloaming I am listening 
To the patter of the rain, 

And it whispers to me something, 
In a laughing, light refrain. 

Yes, a secret out of heaven, 
Though it surely is of earth; 

Just the sweet refrain — she loves me. 
In rain-music has its birth. 



74 



MEMORY'S MOODS 

If memory play a pleasant part, 
She smiles and smiles away my heart; 
Spiteful, she spoils the sunny days, 
In bitterness her half debt pays. 

And naught I ask or aught could be 
Can change these moods of memory, 
And so companioned, side by side, 
With joy and grief I must abide. 



75 



TIME 

A soul I am, sin-free, new born, 
On earth commanding what I will; 

An overlord, I stay the morn 

And hold the flying century still. 

All darkest hours with joy I mate, 

Make sweet the strong, make brave the weak 
And suffering long a silent state, 

I make all nature's mutes to speak. 

The trees and hills praise me in prayers. 

The rivers voice a joyous theme. 
And what a happy tongue is theirs — 

When day is whitest and supreme. 

A soul I am, yet I must know 

The world, its every mystic thrill; 

So I this hour my heaven forego 
To hold the flying century still. 



76 



UNPRAISED 

A single singing bird can fill 

The lucent atmosphere with song; 

Returning spring wakes in its trill 
All men and maids, a praising throng. 

A poet sings, and spring days hold 
No sweeter sounds than his unpraised, 

He yet finds men and maidens cold, 
His first unfolding song unpraised. 



77 



MY MUSE 

The day is drear with sullen tears 
And all the winter waste is blurred, 

Yet I am close to gladdest years, 
My muse in thrilling music heard. 

While wrapped in sunshine, fold on fold. 

Old Time our dying must withhold. 



78. 



THE POET 

Sweet lyrics sing their simple way 

Into the hearts of child or man, 
Man perfectly attuned to play, 

The child whose soul his years outran; 
And poets may be proud to pen 

These little thoughts for such a child, 
For children who are wearied men. 

Whose ache comes from a day defiled. 

But oh, what poet would not speak 

The one resounding word that tells 
Of wrath that must its vengeance wreak, 

So that its blow a wrong dispels; 
That he a magic wand might raise. 

Bring earth to heaven and heaven to earth, 
And, singing with great gods, sing praise. 

From woe to wake but smiles and mirth. 

So he would steal the sting from crime, 

Would, kissing, heal the bleeding smart, 
Then, dallying a day with time, 

Would halt the grief that seeks man's heart : 
And he might shape the shapeless soul 

With ruin sunken-eyed and cowed, 
Then lead him on to pity's goal, 

There mask his face his sin avowed. 
79 



8o The Poet 



While seizing from the heavens anew 

The sense wherein man's love is bred, 
The poet finds the wonder true, 

Hell's foul and lying love instead: 
Then sometimes is he mad with dreams 

And gathering lyrics from the past. 
Each happy one more joyous seems, 

As sung, the summer to forecast. 

With lyrics may the poets please 

The children of a sunny day, 
But kissing bleeding wounds they ease 

The anguished souls who weep, 
And so, if poets healers be 

For this they ask nor gold, nor gain, 
Suffice it if their lyrics key 

In tune with songs that sweet remain. 



BELLS AND BELLS 

Into silvered silence breaking, 
Scarce uttering a whispered note, 

Life speaks, in bells and bells soft -singing 
The love- words that in ether float. 

In silence, sun-arrayed and rosy, 

The mother dreams her first fine dreams. 
Dreams sung, in bells and bells outwinging 
Till all the world a radiance seems. 

In denser silence, dark with doubting, 
Revealing hosts of frightened things. 

Hearts cry, in bells and bells outflinging 
The beating of Death's raven wings. 

But, breaking into golden silence 

A single sound stirs far away, 
Then near, in bells and bells, sweet-ringing 

To say that Christ is risen today. 

As each bell breaks the golden silence 
Surprising souls from thinking men, 

Listen ! in bells and bells outswinging 
Are prayers that sing themselves again. 



8i 



PRISCILLA 

Priscilla is my laughing lady, 
Past mistress of the pleasing art, 

Wherewith, in sorcery bewitching, 
She steals away from me my heart. 

And mocking is this little lady. 
For this one theft will not atone, 

She flouts me while my heart in keeping 
Withholds the giving of her own. 



82 



IN AND OUT \ 

In and out, in and out, 

Threaded shuttles go, 
In and out, round about. 

Suddenly, then slow. 

In and out, webs to weave, 

Silken and spun gold; 
In and out, a thread to leave 

Run fine in damask fold. 

In and out, in and out, 

Busy shuttles play. 
In and out, round about, 

Life's o'ertangled day. 

In and out, a web to weave. 

Silken and spun gold. 
In and out, a thread to leave 

That Sorrow shall enfold. 

In and out, in and out, 
Wearied shuttles cease — 

First to spin silk threads about 
The web of golden Peace. 



83 



RETOLD 

Oh Time, instead of telling me 

That lurking in my single hour 
Which stretches to Eternity, 

Is budding thought that may not flower, 
Tell me that in this hour I find 

Flowering thought whose buds unfold, 
Fulfilled sweet blossoms of the mind, 

Rare truths in beauty thus retold. 



84 



EXPIATION 

A wanderer, man asks no boon 

Of Fate, whose spiked arms must flay, 
And flay him walking (ash o'erstrewn) 

Life's vanishing and once green way ; 
The way where fire soon charred all things 

That overmaster if they please, 
Beauty, pomp, and wealth that brings 

To sufferers no light nor ease. 

A wanderer, his earth is set 

With cruel thorns that tear his feet. 
His day is dark, with blood stains wet, 

And naught is left there seeming sweet. 
Yet, in the gloom he seeks to find 

The gleam of many little lights 
That rise exultant in the mind 

When happiness with peace unites. 

He walks the burning ash-strewn way. 

Till suddenly the fire is dead 
And flowers again the once green day 

As Fate bestows a boon instead, 
The one impassioned hour wherein 

God's firmament has spread its glow 
Upon his expiated sin, 

His heritage of waste and woe. 



85 



BE TRUE 

Are you 
Full satisfied if mating winds be sweet 

And lull you, prisoned, into melting dreams 
Where unrestraint and soulless pleasures meet, 

Forgetting, in this destiny, its means ? 

Be true 
And rather ask that mating winds be strong, 
Whose beating wings arrest and wake your 
soul. 
So wild and crimson glamours be not long — 
So bruised days wake happily and whole. 



86 



LOST FANCIES 

Adown the wildering, winding way 

Of flying time I go 
To look for Fancies gone astray, 

Whose every name I know, 
Rose, violets and lilies too — 
All rooted where they, winging, flew. 

By light of dreams inwoven so 

With moonshine that I see, 
I find them where they rooted grow 

In blossoming to be 
My sweet and mellowed mysteries, 
My Fancies, my lost melodies. 

I call them by the names I gave 

To each in tenderness, 
Seeking their love for me to save 

I would their souls possess — 
Rose, violets and lilies too, 
Rooted where they, winging, flew. 

They answered me but would not come — 

How could they, rooted so? 
They could not, winging, fly back home. 

They could not come, ah, no! 
So lost to me my mysteries. 
My Fancies, my sweet melodies. 



87 



TRADITION 

Tradition chains me, dumb as in a trance, 
Wake, Revelation ! wear the bonds away, 

Then will my life be young unshamed romance 
As into Freedom's endless realm I stray. 



88 



JUST ONE 

Oh happiness! 
Leave one of all thy joys to me, 

Just one — that in my meagre days 
The twilight shall not hastened be, 

That morning in my pleasure stays. 

No more, no less — 
Just one pure joy with no desire 

To roam in radiancy and far, 
Just one, all mine, for ever mine, 

Of my lone heritage the star. 



89 



POVERTY AND WEALTH 

Companions in the city streets, 

Walk shambling Poverty and Wealth, 

But Poverty, in tears, retreats, 

Treading with heavy foot and stealth. 

While Wealth, shod easily and fine — 
His stalking vSclf soft wound about 

With silvered robes where gems outshine, 
Wears affluence the day throughout. 

Wealth dangles gold and with it buys 
Sad sin, with pain the aftermath. 

While Poverty, though hunger-wise. 
Shares half the single crust he hath. 

Then Poverty, soft wrapped in grace — 
The raiment of a silken sheen — 

Stands glorified in paupered space, 
The noonday smiling in his mien. 



9<j 



ENOUGH FOR ME 

I never longed to journey where 
Adventure might in peril be, 

But rather my uplifted prayer 

For near sweet-sheltering would Vje; 

If Tragedy be lurking there, 

Pray Love to change its destiny. 

I never longed to hasten days 

Whose uttermost I would not know, 

Enough for me the sunny rays 
Of this one day's revealing glow. 



91 



HOPE AND FEAR 

Hope loves me, for I love its rose, 
Fear hates me for I fear it so, 

But Hope its rose doth interpose 
My fear of Fear to overthrow. 



92 



MARJORIE SWEET 

Marjorie sweet, will you be mine 
And let me kiss you as I will, 

Since to your tears I must incline 
As to your rippling laughter thrill? 

No thought of yours I would not know, 
To me your faintest voice is clear, 

And nearer to your heart to grow 
I would hold you ever dear. 

Marjorie sweet, why hide your face, 
So loath to yield yourself to me. 

For when so potent is your grace. 
Fathom I must its mystery. 

Your glooming cannot daunt my will. 
My heart will kiss your laughter, tears, 

My soul to yours will ever thrill, 
Far on, far on untroubled years. 



93 



THE SHADOW 

Life's shadow holds within its dark 
Love's mangled beauties and its aches, 

God's tomb it is, the shielding mark 
That Pity in his mercy makes. 



94 



UNDERCURRENTS 

The grieving of a lonely child, 

Shorn both of faith and tenderness; 

The child whose day is spoiled with tears 
Untuned to love-sung happiness. 

The shrinking of a woman's heart, 

So strained that must it break in twain; 

The strings vibrating to the love 
Whose song is e'er recalled in vain. 

The murder of a man's delight. 

His power deep rent with failing will, 

Success, his god of worship, dead — 

And dead his singing sweet heart-thrill. 

So all these grieving ones must weep 

In hidden places of the soul. 
And, yet, sing artifice in song 

And, tricking self, smile on, cajole. 



95 



TOO DEAR 

Who holds within his hands one year, 
Whose strange completeness is too dear, 

Must loose his hold 

And round him fold 
The years whose drifting days are sad, 
Too incomplete, nor dear, nor glad; 

And yet he may 

The loss delay, 
Remembering in a dream the year 
Whose strange completeness was too dear. 



96 



MAKE-BELIEVE 

So many drifting thoughts to weave, 
I set them in a shining loom, 

Then broider them in Make-beHeve 
And paint them pink as flower-bloom. 

The threads so fine and soft to spin. 
That Love no subtler ones could find 

(Wherewith his raiment to begin, 
Its rose red-glamour there refined). 

In Make-believe I spin all days, 
So purity and hope weave white 

In singing looms that live always, 
And weave thereof Life's true delight. 



97 



POWER 

The light that enters into sorrow 
In crucibles of faith refined; 

Hope burning incense to the morrow, 
Its fragrant fire, the might of Mind. 



98 



THE ARTIST 

'Tis thine, the subtle master hand 
That seized the heart of Lady-Fair 

And held it near, to understand 
The way to paint it as 'tis there 

On canvas, heart within her eyes, — 

Eyes blue as blue from Paradise. 

And (as you pictured first her face. 
Then fixed the fragrance of her mind) 

You caught the essence of her grace 
And drew it with a touch so kind 

That it veiled her delicate as mist — 

Mist, by the flush of morn soft kissed. 

Oh, Lady-Fair, portrayed a queen. 
Your soul is sunlight to the shade; 

A flower you are, arrayed in sheen 
A moon in tender weaving made; 

Of queens, the queen, smile yes to me 

In answer to my lover's plea. 



99 



SWEETHEART 

Just out of sleep I wake to dream 
Again the dream, I dreamed of you; 

In night's deep gloom it is the gleam 
That lights my doubting soul anew. 

Oh Sweetheart ! as in sleep you loved — 
So love me even now and say 

The little word of heart approved, 
That you are mine this dreamless day. 



THE BLIND 

Long lurking in the shadow I 

Am frightened in the barren place. 

I feel its menace, standing by, 

Muffling my soul, my stricken face. 

The dark so endless that I know 
That though I walk there to and fro 
Its deeps will hold me ever fast, 
Its aimless silence o'er me cast. 

Thus lost in desolation I 

Am halted with retarded feet. 

Yea, dwarfed, until I learn to fly. 

Fly on where night and morning meet. 

I fly with wings God gives me, so 
To roam where only Thoughts can go, 
In places thronged with shape on shape, 
Where soul and I in song escape. 



lOI 



THE FRUITFUL HOUR 

Of all my youth there was no flower, 
No single blossom of the mind, 

And now in age, the fruitful hour. 
Rich harvesting of soul I find. 

The youth I loved was void of rose, 

And planting seeds 

I planted weeds. 
And now the seeds I plant are those 

That grow apace, 

Whose buds grow grace, 
The bloom of mind that opes a rose. 



I02 



THE DEAF MUTE 

No fellowship with men have I, 
No song of winging grass I hear, 

Nor least of melodies, a sigh 
To pierce my' ever silent sphere. 

But I can see, see Spring turned gay, 
And down its unrebuking way 
I mount my dream to ride the steed 
With guileless pleasure in the lead. 

Bending the meadow-poppies low, 
I see the breezes blown to rest; 

See tremors of the day run slow. 
The foretaste of the dying west. 

See beauty bloom and fade the year; 
But could I once sweet music hear 
When homing shadows past me fly, 
We'd know lost heaven, my soul and I. 



103 



THE SONG WRITER 

Just let him speak in song alone 
And few will score his lack of wit, 

His thoughts will hidden be, unknown 
As though in secret cypher writ ; 

Though tinged with heart's blood few will read 

Or understand his mystic creed. 



104 



OVER ALL 

Over all 
The music of the hours 

Whose dawn is risen after 
The shadow-fallen showers, 

One hears the song and laughter 
Of golden-hearted flowers. 

Over all 
The tunes of leaves a-kissing, 
No faintest tremor missing, 
One hears the dewdrop shiver, 
Its bleeding heart aquiver, 
Afraid of hurt in falling. 
While wanton winds are calling. 

Over all 
The music of Life's hours 

Whose dawn is risen after 
The night wherein one cowers, 

One hears the song and laughter 
Of Love, its heart-sweet flowers. 

Over all 

The tunes of lips a-kissing, 
No faintest echo missing, 
One hears the soul soft shiver 
Its bleeding heart aquiver, 
Afraid of hurt in falling 
Should Death its love be calling. 

105 



COMPENSATION 

I craved the Summer's largess, 
Her dream, her scented boon; 

She gave me tears — yet rose-leaf, 
The happy heart of June. 

I sought Life's fairest bounty. 
True love's unwasting good; 

She gave me grief — yet glory 
And a heart the world withstood. 



1 06 



LOVE AWAKES 

Love forsakes 
The long noon of the rose-scented ways, 

And awakes 
In a riot of soft -lulling days, 
Yet is mated to music and madness, 
Sweet as sighs of the sea singing gladness. 

Love is near, 

Love is dear, 

Love is mine 
As the sea-sighs incline 
To the mating of music and madness. 
Overwrought in the joy of life's gladness. 



107 



CONQUEST 

Fond of life's tumult I battle 
For Self, lest it break in the war, 

Break ere the carnage is finished, 

While carnage holds conquest in store. 



1 08 



THE UNSEEING 

So lost in shadowland am I, 

I ne'er can wander from its thrall, 

And yet my lagging feet would fly 
And follow nature's wildest call. 

My groping hands can kiss the flowers, 
Their perfumed hearts can beat for me 

And I can hear the whispering hours, 
Hear secrets blossomed from the sea. 

I sense the day, its highest noon, 
My dark the dark of starless night 

And Love I know, his voice in tune 
With all the mysteries of light. 

His melody enfolds me so. 

That my heaven opens through his song. 
Yet could I see, see earth's warm glow, 

My feet would fly the clouds among. 

For I would fly the winged way 

Of seraphs floating towards the sun; 

My soul of souls, this prayer I pray 
Once let me see God's day begun. 



109 



LONELINESS 

As with cold courage armed, I smile and dare 
To enter Loneliness in regal state, 

And unassuaged the burden I can bear 

Though, hurt in heart, I proudly bear my 
fate. 

True, I can bear the bruising loneliness. 
The longing of a tender heart at bay. 

Yet I would sheltered be, brave life the less. 
Call Love and keep him comrade day by day. 



IF ONLY IN A DREAM 

Wrought in a day the love I bear 

And proudly wear; 
I ask not if I woo in vain, 

My spirit fain 
Capitulates, then gives you more 

Of my heart's store. 

Of sacrifice I give no dole, 

I give my soul, 
Creating of my joy a dream. 

The dream supreme 
Wherein my gladness sheds no tear; 

How could it, dear? 

How could I spend my ecstasy 

Risen to thee. 
Save in this dream your lips to kiss. 

So seize my bliss 
If only in a dream I may 

My love betray. 



SUNSHINE'S MORROW 

O'erwhelmed with direful days of sorrow 
Joy's little hour is almost dead, 

And yet the glint of Sunshine's Morrow 
Wings near him, thus to overspread 

His darkness with a gladsome glory, — 

Joy's aftermath in sweeter story. 



112 



SUDDEN MUSIC 

Sudden sweet music flies to me, 
It skims along from tree to tree, 
A lilting, soft and tricksy tune. 
Wind-borne and speeding through the June. 

A lilting tricksy tune to me. 
It sings of lover's dreams to be, 
And fills the long dead days with bliss 
And joy as pure as love's first kiss. 



113 



FORGOTTEN HOURS 

How bring them back — forgotten hours, — 

Long lost in Hfe's great wilderness? 
Can they be born again in flowers, 
Their fragrance but the sweet redress 
For pain and truth, 
That spoiled my youth 
And mated me to loneliness? 

I'd call them if they could but hear: 

And think you they would know my voice, 
Like ghosts returning to this sphere 
Awake and with me once rejoice, 
Laugh once again, 
Sing joy's refrain. 
Bring love, first love that was my choice. 



114 



THE DIAMOND 

Embosomed in my hand I hold 
A bauble glistening amber gold: 
The gleams of rosy sunlight dart 
Within its clear white crystal heart. 

God holds me so in His strong hand, 
My soul, the crystal to withstand 
Life's drifting colours dark or sad, 
Keeping my heart both pure and glad. 



"5 



IN LONELY STATE 

Hushed as woodland deeps 
When wearied daytime sleeps, 
Is my long and lonely state, 
My heart disconsolate. 

No laughter turned to bliss. 
No song in this abyss, 
No stirring of dead air 
That rising might be prayer. 

I wonder who will come 
And fathoming the numb 
And dreary self of me, 
Then kiss me tenderly — 

So I will wake and find 
Glad music in the wind; 
Eternal harmony 
Once risen sweet for me. 

Love, pity me and come 

And change me, wan and dumb, 

To radiancy, a thing 

To pray, to laugh, to sing. 



ii6 



IN A GOLDEN HOUR 

Born of a golden hour is song 
And wild its first sweet voyaging, 

The flight as far, as swift, as long. 
As that of homing birds a-wing. 

Song searching heaven's own blue for rest, 
So searching earth's bedewed wide space, 

It seeks my heart in final quest 
And finds therein a nesting place. 



117 



SWEET MUSIC 

The Simimer's sigh, sweet music is, 
Heaven's voice to mortal madness, 

A memory new-born to bHss 
With a tender touch of sadness. 

'Tis rhythm soft enticing me 
To leave behind heartaching, 

A grief forgotten flowing free 
In minor harmonies outbreaking. 

Waking sweet from long repose 
When Music steals into my quiet, 

It soothes again fresh wakened woes, 
And lulls my pain's too poignant riot. 

Oh! Music, Music, call me long. 
My soul will thrill in its replying; 

Its hopes will sing a song for song, 
A symphony undying. 



ii8 



DRIFTING 

Drifting, I am drifting, 

Unsought, unguessed the goal, 
In pain to passion shifting, 

I pay the worid my toll. 



119 



DEFEAT 

A frail incompetent am I, 

Juggling with my happiness, 
Tossing the cup of joy so high 

It turns and spills its lavishness 
All spoiled and at my feet. 

Such ample store of joy was there, 
So little that I might have had, 

Yet not a precious thing my share : 

Life owed me something good and glad, 
Some secret oversweet. 

A frail incompetent am I 

Routed by a dauntless foe: 
Yearning, when I would defy, 

The cup of chance but threw me woe — 
I die in my defeat 



120 



FAIR MISTRESS 

I need not tell you what I could 

Or would to let you know my heart ,- 

I need not tell you, for you know 
And see it true, my speech apart. 

You see it shining in my eyes, — 
No secret there you cannot find, 

Love's ecstasy you soon divine. 

Fair mistress of my might and mind. 



121 



LIKE BUTTERFLIES 

With no reluctant, heavy tread 

The days pass by, 

They winged fly, 
But speeding to the past, fall dead. 
And with them goes the heart of me, 
Unshamed yet worn with misery. 

In hurried flight new days are here, 
Not asking why 
They too must die. 
Buried to be in leaf grown sere: 
Not asking they and I ask not. 
For the heart of me is dead, forgot. 

God's requiem is sung for them 

And sung for me : 

I make no plea 
For life, nor do I death condemn; 
Once only we in sunshine fly 
Like butterflies — in an hour to die. 



HEARTS FOR SALE 

Know you of the merchants 
Whose barter is time-old, 

SelHng hearts for silver, 
Buying them with gold? 

They ply their trade in open, 
They hold a life for gain. 

But lost to them is something 
Their traffic may not stain. 

Fools they are, forgetting 
That a world of shining gold 

In barter buys nor sells not. 
Dear love, the love time-old. 



123 



THE AUTOMOBILE 

Whizzing and whirring, 
The breath of me swift, 

I fly as birds stirring, — 
May's petals adrift. 

Straight I am going, 
Speeding the way, 

Wilder, then slowing 
To idle the day. 

Long enough staying 
To gossip with flowers; 

Mastery displaying, 
Fly fast as the hours. 

Whirring and purring, 
I tremble then hush, 

New conquests averring, 
On and on rush. 

On to the river, 

To hills at the top — 
A gasp and a quiver, 

A victor to stop. 



134 



FICKLE FORTUNE 

Life held me 'gainst his breast awhile, 
Caresses on my lips he pressed, 

In sweet communion to beguile 
Me from the cruel world's unrest. 

So kind his kiss, I thought him mine 
And thought his love the love supreme: 

My youth to him was sweet, divine, 
But ah ! his fervour proved a dream. 

He left me turned adrift to face 

Hate's frozen breath, Grief's storm blown 
wild, 
Of his warm tenderness no trace 

To cheer his disillusioned child. 



125 



THE DREAMER 

My tired eyes have seen the ghosts 

Of my ambition's past, 
The Might-Have-Beens, the swarming hosts 

Perishing from first to last. 

Crowding my world, these spirits rise 

Their martyrdom to speak, 
Avenging fiends with fiery eyes, 

My shrinking self to seek. 

Unworthily my hands refuse 

To work for great reward. 
For nature built me small to choose 

The smaller man's award. 

Aimless and yet in thrall I bide 

With not a wish save one. 
To roam in dreamland far and wide, 

A journey never done. 

Gathering flowers and sweets the way 

That wiser men passed by. 
Listening to songs that angels sway, 

So life I satisfy. 



126 



LOVE AND I 

Bred in ease and wed together, 
Love and I have faced bad weather, 
Weal and woe both sang to us. 
Singing sad or amorous: 
Travelling onward both together. 
Love and I have faced bad weather. 

Love went down the vanished distance, 
Youth to age in unresistance ; 
Where he went, 'twas there went I, 
Neither thought to say good-bye; 
Bred in ease and wed together, 
Love and I have faced bad weather. 



ja7 



THE JESTER 

He wore awhile 

Vanity's smile 
That speaks the fool in cap and bells, 
And he dispensed the joy that sells 

For current gold; 

His mirth extolled, 
Men tasted of his wine and knew 
It savoured sweet of Folly's brew: 
Forsooth his laughing lip was loud 
(The tears of his world unavowed). 

Day changed to night, 

Came sudden blight. 
Then half his simple wit untold. 
His merry quip was wan and cold, 

And he that day 

Was laid away. 
Hid in a grave all flowerless; 
But Folly, dressed in sombreness, 
Laid over him all reverent 
His cap and bells, his monument. 

Poor mountebank, the self-made fool, 
Lazy Pleasure's boughten tool 
Of men imp'risoned in themselves, 
The fool who into folly delves. 

Heart undefiled, 

For wife and child. 



128 



UNFULFILLED 

Not mine Life's transient heritage of peace, 
Its pristine beauty passion-pure and true;^ 
Plans unfulfilled and dark were those I knew, 
The visioned promises that growing cease 
When day is young and fades in quick decease, 
Fades like the famished buds, the early few 
Whose little blossoms die each day anew: 
And yet had Love, in sweet or veiled caprice, 
But promised half his rose-time faith to me, 
Sharing my human loneliness in part, 
(His fitful sudden passion but to be 
The symbol of his wayward selfish art,) 
My wistful dreams would still have been that 

we, 
One splendid hour, spoke softly heart to heart. 



129 



HOW I HAVE LOVED 

I, who have loved, loved man 

For much of learning, much of might: 

The measure of his wit outran 
The fleet ness of the eagle's flight, 
But it was love that burned to blight. 

So I have woman loved as true, 
She of the whitest soul that lives, 

She who pensive, sweet in rue, 
Her every enemy forgives. 
But 'twas not love that life outlives. 

Thus I have loved a child so well, 
That days seemed only fleeting hours 

Lingering 'neath her winsome spell, 

When Time grew naught but gentle flowers ; 
Soon faded this sweet love of ours. 

As parents loved, I loved again, 
So wise and sure the overflow 

Of tenderness in hearts not vain. 

In hearts of men who faith foreknow, 
And yet Death changed this love to woe. 

But Nature I have loved as I 

Would love the soul God gave to me, 

Naught in its life to crucify — 
Just splendour born of liberty — 
Love marvellous, love strange and free. 



130 



SLEEP ON 

Sleep on, Man of mystery, sleep ! 
The night will shield your soul to keep 
Its reason both sane and well, 
In dreams its power to foretell. 

Sleep on, Man of mystery, sleep ! 
Through night sweet constancy to reap 
And thereby dream a dream thereof. 
Of your first birthright — dream of love. 



131 



SAFETY-LAND 



Troubled, I sailed Life's ocean wide and dark, 

Filled to the brink with pain and tyranny. 

And in a shallop hastened to embark 

To make my journey into mystery : 

And naught of sailor's tongue or crafts I knew, 

Had not a compass near my useless hand ; 

Winds wilding in the rigging, on I flew, 

No guide to help me understand 

The shackling hungry waves that threatened 

me, 
And some so angered that they felled me quick : 
I fled from pain and tyranny to be 
But stranded on new shoals afraid, heart-sick, 
Till, graciously God's strong and guiding hand 
Steered me aright to sunny Safety-Land. 



II 



In Safety-Land I rest with storms asleep, 
Forgetting dreary days of dark and din; 
Youth in my eyes that softened cannot weep, 
Life's glad and joyous budding hours begin;, 
132 



Safety-Land 133 

And then compelling knowledge from the least 
Of things transfiguring my tired life, 
Upon their instant vividness I feast : 
Then wake the luscious sweets of leaf-time, rife 
Enough to stir yet soothe my fired brain 
To something of a slowing consciousness, 
Wherein my hopeful prayer is not in vain, 
And breathing peace therefrom I solemm bless 
God's perfect, pliant, yet controlling hand 
That anchored me in Safety-Land. 



DEATH 

Stealing down the heavenly path 

'Twixt sunshine and the midnight rain 

I come for treasure that man hath 
Enfolded to his heart in vain. 

I'll leave him naught wherewith to buy 
Earth's balm he sought before I came; 

Courageous, bold, unthrilled or shy, 
To each my message is the same. 

Perchance it is not pain I bring 
To lay upon unwilling hearts, 

But rather to allay Life's sting, 

Benign to quell Love's hurt that smarts. 

Let him not dread my step, for I 
Will tread so still he will not know 

That I have been and gone and why 
I was his friend and not his foe. 



134 



THE WALTZ 

'Tis soft insinuating rhythm, 

That sings its subtle swinging way 

Mid hearts whose unfulfilled sweet longings 
Are mastered by its tender sway. 

Entranced then by this mellowed music, 

Triumphant as it glorifies, 
Hearts find their mating hearts in waiting,— 

Waiting in Love's paradise. 



135 



YOU WHO HAVE FAILED ME 

You who have failed me, failed your God; 

Your feet, of conquering unaware. 
Could neither climb nor pierce the sod, 

Nor were they truants seeking fair 
And faultless regions for sweet flower; 

They only stayed and clogged the way — 
Inert companions of the hour, 

A bloodless service to obey. 

So you forgot your dower right, 

Your warrior soul's inheritance, 
The law which urges you to might : 

Steeped in the wan and lifeless trance, 
Can you awake to seize the earth. 

In sacrifice your soul to shrive, 
March on to master love and mirth. 

These of all heart joys to survive? 



136 



LOVE'S HEART OF ROSE 

Love has a heart of scented rose 
And yet a heart of thorns has he; 
One favouring, the other cold, 
Will each for me 
Its leaf unfold? 

Oh! heart of thorns and heart of rose, 
If wooing you would sue for me, 
Together you must leaf unfold, 
One sweet to be, 
The other cold. 



137 



MY HEART'S SWEET FLOWER 

In the hush of shadow-time, the hour 
When contented summer is at rest, 

Then wakes my playtime fair in flower : 
The playtime of my brain in quest 

Of little dreams and splendid dreams, — 

With myriad such the soft air teems. 

I find the little dreams and great 
In hiding with the world asleep, 

Their secrets held inviolate. 

Save one that could not silence keep 

When in my playtime's idle hour 

It sings of you, my heart's sweet flower. 



138 



VISION 

'Tis prophecy, the dawn of day, 
That calls the unborn year at will 
Plenty or famine to fulfil. 

'Tis scent of spring asleep in clay, 
Its hopeful heart within the seed. 
The seed beneath the ungrassed mead, 

'Tis Mother pride, in meek disguise, 
Discerning in her babe's first hour 
The promise of imperial power. 

'Tis love uncovering love's surprise 
Thereunder glimpsing primal lore, 
The wonderful in Nature's store. 



139 



LOVE'S DAY 

There is a day whereof my song sings oft, 

The day that lay between love's hope and 
fear, 

So long the span it seemed a saddened year; 
Then all earth's sweetest music was not soft 
Although on Heaven's wings it soared aloft, 

For then I came to know my first heart-tear. 

'Twas love's distress, the lonely mystic seer 
At whose dread prophecy I once had scoffed. 

I scoffed to hide the hurt of me that cried. 
To hide my craven fear, I laughed aloud, 
I laughed, then cried, then came the day 
whereof 
So oft I sing, the day with joy allied. 

Then earth's sweet music was my faith 

avowed 
And Heaven's white wings soft wafted it to 
Love. 



140 



MY HEART'S DESIRE 

Last night he came from No-Man's Land 
Borne on a cloud of silvered gold, 

The flower of love was in one hand, 
Its ever mystic tale retold. 

But now a denizen of earth, 

Wakened he wails as mortals may, 

Or else, untaught, he smiles his mirth. 
His smile the sun that floods my day. 

From No-Man's Land he came to me, 

Came as a dream through pain's white fire, 

Came so a warrior to be, 
A monarch and my Heart's Desire. 



141 



MERE MEMORIES 

Memories, mere memories, 

They steal along the lonely day 
That lengthens into sleepless nights: 

Shadowy things that subtly play 
Upon my wakened consciousness; 

Just here and there a phantom face 
Or gently touching hands that kiss, 

And kiss as with a sweet embrace. 

Forgotten music echoes low 

The lullaby or Mother's prayer, 
The scent of rose or violets 

Intrudes upon the listless air. 
Love that was sweetest enters in 

The dream of summer days gone by, 
While pain doth there its wail begin, 

Forsooth too sad for such as I. 

Lonely the day and sleepless night, 

Though tears or ecstasy the gain 
That memory can bring me now : 

Waning, as memories ever wane. 
Both glad and sad they come, so go, 

These shadowy things that subtly play 
Upon my wakened consciousness — 

When silently they haunt my day. 



142 



JUST THEN 

Who loves his solitude to be 
The silence of an empty hour, 

The hour as void of dreams as glee, 
The hour unfilled with song or flower. 

His soul is sleeping hopelessly. 

Who peoples one waste hour with men 
Made vivid by his dreaming power, 

He mates with joy again, again, 

The hour is filled with song and flower 

And soul awakes just then, just then. 



143 



ON THE UPHILL ROAD 

On the travelled, the winding, the long uphill 
road, 

Is the slow dragging tread of the funeral train ; 
To a cold looker on 'tis a day's episode, 

To the silent one mourner a passage of pain. 

Deep the swathing that hides from the world his 
worst woe. 
Gay the roses that smother the wan woman's 
face. 
While the long uphill road is o'erlaid with pure 
snow 
And the evergreens grow on the burial place. 

And the light of the day 

Warms the evergreen bed 
Where they place her away. 

The dear loved one called dead. 

In the sun's glistening glow, 

The red roses stay red 
On the bed of white snow 

Where they lay her just dead. 
144 



On the Uphill Road 145 

Strange the wrappings of his inarticulate woe, 
And as alien the rose that a guard o'er her 
keeps, 
But immortal the faith whose one bloom must 
o'ergrow 
Sweet fulfilled, on the still and white bed 
where she sleeps. 



A GREY DAY 

A grey day greys the more when Grief 
Is draped in shadows danger-deep, 

Hurt to the heart by hurt behef , 
Wonted to woes that never sleep. 

But greyest days can gladden when 
Grief's danger-deeps have lightened so 

That hope re-enters vanquished men, 
Inspiring love while deadening woe. 

Oh! grey day, all too grey for me, 

I choose you when you change to rose, 

Your hurt heart healed as mine must be 
Warm with the glow that joy bestows. 



146 



FRIVOLOUS BETTY 

She was winsome and fair in her features 
This dear Betty, whose amber green eyes 

Called, "But follow me following pleasure," 
Then I went with her, wise or unwise. 

She went forth into sunshine well faring, 
And she skirted the meadows' green ways : 

To the lilt of the robin she listened. 
As it sang its sweet spring roundelays. 

Yes, I followed this frivolous Betty, 
In a gambol and dance on the lea. 

Where we found a wee nestling just fallen 
From his weather- torn nest in the tree. 

And this Betty — Ah! how can I tell it, 
How she sprang at her victim, while I 

Either wise or unwise in my fealty, 
Neither stayed her not did I outcry. 

But why should I, a reasoning creature, 
Have halted her catching her prey? 

She was frivolous Betty, my kitten, 
Seeking pleasure in nature's own way. 



147 



CUPID 

With Cupid in the foreground 

And Norah at his side, 
And I her closest neighbour, 

How Gould Cupid be defied? 

For fear he might be flouted, 
With Norah was he shy, 

But Cupid fixed me quaking. 
By the flashing of his eye. 

He pierced me with his arrow 
And Norah kissed the wound, 

And I kissed Norah, kissing 

While dear Cupid never frowned. 



148 



THE MASTER MUSICIAN 

My art knows one illusive hour of praise, 
Supreme if incomplete, for this more sweet, 

Having no counterpart in other days, 

Save in a dream its twin-born I may meet. 

The peoples' god, I love my man's life more, 
Unhaunted by regret, my eyes incline 

To unknown quiet years with joy in store, 
Fairer than this of fame's that now is mine, 



149 



SLEEPING NIGHT 

Life vanishes in sleeping night, 
His dreams therein a mute delight, 
And beggared Love finds shelter there 
In sacred tryst his hopes to bare. 

Time only steals night's dreams away, 
Taken from silence to the day, 
Whereto Love, Life, and Hope return, 
Never again for night to yearn. 

Though, gained the world's accustomed place, 
Never again night's dreams to grace, 
Love, Life and Hope there learned how sleep 
Inviolate could secrets keep. 



150 



LOVE'S SHARE 

Impetuous and debonair, 

Love importuned me for a share 

Of all my days and half my heart : 
With artless ardour I gave this, 
Then Love, deceiver that he is. 

Desired what I withheld in part : 
So with a sweet, persuasive look, 
The half I did not give he took. 

Thus vanquishing my life, my heart. 



f5i 



LIFE 

Loud I knocked at the door of Heaven's portals, 
Found it closed and thus closed it remained ; 

For unheralded Death it was opened, 

Death in cerements stained or unstained. 



152 



MY GRANDFATHER'S CLOCK 

I was warned of the wasting, the wandering 

midnight 
By the muffled repeat of the tick-tack tock 
Of the querulous voice of my grandfather's 

clock ; 
At the sound of his sighing rose fluttering 

spectres, 
Allured by the changing but changeless tick 

tock 
Of the wise winning soul of my grandfather's 

clock. 

And they came first avenging for overspent 
passions, 
All too wearily worn to the tick-tack tock 
Of the minor set tunes of my grandfather's 
clock, 
But near in the moonlight soft hovered fair 
spirits 
Who plaintively sang to the tick-tack tock 
Of the unceasing rhythm of my grandfather's 
clock. 

153 



154 My Grandfather's Clock 

Then increasingly fair were the dreams of my 
dreaming 

That in wavering hushed with the tick-tack 
tock 

Of the slowing heartbeat of my grandfather's 
clock, 
And these dreams were they born of illusion or 
glory 

Faded gently at day when the tick-tack tock 

Sighing stopped, the soul fled from my grand- 
father's clock. 



WARFARE 

Victor of men unvanquished 

Till trumpeted I came, 
They fell at my stern bidding, 

Were conquered without shame. 

Alas, that I must enter 

The realms of brotherhood, 

The vaunted pose of friendship 
So falls in my dread mood. 



155 



FAREWELL 

Farewell to life's too pleasant things, 
To the brook unconscious that it sings; 
To aspiring trees whose promised fruit 
Drinks sweets upwelling from the root; 
To the hills whose heights are dripping dew, 
For fevered days to sip anew. 

Farewell to song that sings a smile, 
To honour stripping fame from guile : 
Farewell to life's beseeching hours, 
To justice leading shame to flowers 
The whitest for her hand to pick; 
To faith who weds with men heartsick. 

Farewell to morn whose silent grace 
Wakes limitless in roseate space; 
To noon who fires thought with glow, 
To twilight where wan day dreams grow: 
Farewell to great and gladsome days, 
To hope fulfilled that perfect stays. 

Farewell! The word drags on and on 
As wearily I dwell upon 
Love with sweet face and ardent eyes. 
Eyes yearning for self-sacrifice; 
Farewell with this my one last breath. 
My triumph — finding Heaven in death. 



^56 



THE COQUETTE 

On the ledge outside my window 
Two little wrens came near, 

And their chatter was but gossip 
The latest one could hear. 

In the flutter of flirtation 
Said one, a gay coquette, 

** Today I love a lover 
Tomorrow to forget." 

The bolder one her suitor, 
He shook his head and said, 

*'Good-by my little sweetheart, 
I'll seek another maid, — 

*'A wren who' not forgetting 

Her lover of today, 
Will be my bride tomorrow, 

In constancy to stay.'* 



157 



TODAY AND TOMORROW 

Who needs to juggle with Tomorrow, 

Taking hazards on its face, 
Whether to glee or sorrow, 

Let each day have its perfect place. 

Who needs to tarry with the sadness 
That overwhelmed the Yesterday ? 

When splendid is Todaj^'s great gladness, - 
Just ask the fleeting day to stay. 

To stay till we can hoard its laughter 
And keep its fair enchantment still, 

And pile up joys to spend hereafter, 
The treasures lavished when we will. 



158 



AN AFTERNOON TEA 

The prim grasshoppers sat in grave council, 
There was one and Dame Fashion was she, 

Who remarked in her answer to question, 
"Let us give this one afternoon tea." 

They invited their kin and the families 
Of thin spiders and honey-rich bees, 

A beetle or two not so purse proud 

And wee ants who were poorer than these. 

Dressed in gowns that would dazzle the humble. 
With an eyeglass and cane for the fop, 

They soon gathered in crowds in a bower, 
With green vines overhung at the top. 

The viands were spread on a moss bank, 
One the clover leaf sandwich could see, 

And round cakes that were frosted white daisies, 
While gay buttercups held the spiced tea. 

But unversed in the code of the worldlings, — ■ 
That each guest should of dainties partake 

But a sip of the tea sweetly sugared, 
Just a nibble of daisy white cake, — 
159 



i6o An Afternoon Tea 

They all rushed at the feast in a body, 
Like the locusts that ravish earth's way, 

And quick gobbled the least and last goody, 
Satisfied with their brief holiday. 



LOCK AND KEY 

Who thinks that he can buy with gold 
A lock and key to guard the soul, 

Is he who would sweet songs enfold 
Humanly held in his control. 

As well to shackle scent of rose 
Or perfumes of the sea hold fast, 

Or summer's blossom drifts enclose 
In gaols of safety unsurpassed. 

So laughter he would like to keep 
Despoiled of winged liberty, 

Keep spirits of our dreams asleep, 
Shut in his gaol with lock and key. 



i6i 



OF SCANTY ERUDITION 

Of scanty erudition 

And primitive was she, 
But sweet her disposition 

As charming as could be. 

Her eyes were prepossessing, 
Her comprehending sense 

Had one way of expressing 
Its mystic eloquence — 

Her witching ways persisting 

Till I, in love with her, 
Only near her was existing, 

My heartbeats quick astir. 

My soul was in her keeping, 

She's the prettiest thing e'er seen, 

Awake or when in sleeping, 
Of fascinating mien. 

Awake she was capricious. 
To smiles and tears so born, 

Her every way delicious. 

Grown sweeter with each morn. 
162 



Of Scanty Erudition 163 

And though she lacked book-learning 

She knew love's richest lore, 
The lore I learned in yearning 

For the baby I adore. 



THE OLD ACTOR 

Withered in trunk and limb am I, 
Aged in heart and worldly wise, 

No fire in my soul or lips, 
No glint of summer in my eyes. 

And yet am I a stalwart thing. 
The brawny brain of me not dead. 

For I can wring the tears from stones 
And I bleed hearts that never bled. 

For though I tremble I can feign 
What once I was in potent youth, 

The soul of me is not pretence. 
Nor yet in art am I uncouth. 

The faded tones of me are true, 
Yet to the siren calls of men 

Whose idol once I was, I'm young, 
Bowing to plaudits once again. 



164 



FROM THE AGES TO THE NOW 

Oh ! Time, what gifts are in your keeping 

From the Ages to the Now? 
Slumber for stars fore'er unsleeping? 

Nodding for hills that never bow! 

Have you something in your keeping 
To enhance life's smiling eyes? 

From Ages to the Now unsleeping, 
A gift the sceptics to surprise? 

Oh ! Time, of gifts within your keeping 
Is there one that I could find 

That from the Now may not be sleeping, 
Life's music in my human mind? 



165 



WAYFARERS 

Wayfarers on the city streets, 
Virile and footsore on they go, 
Fleeing for life or marching to woe 

While each from love a mate entreats ; 
Wayfarers tempered to summer's mood, 
Won to the world, yet never wooed. 

Questioning nor answering not. 
Wayfarers on and on they go. 
Marching in quick step, marching slow; 

Sinning and sorrow once forgot, 
Knowledge to get and love to gain, 
Wayfarers marching not in vain. 



i66 



DEAR LOVE 

Love, dear Love in charity 
Buy of me my pretty wares, 
The kiss that every lover dares, 
The charm that with desire glows, 
The marvels that my garden grows, 
Sweet-hearted rue and rosemary. 

Love, dear Love in charity 
Buy of me my precious wares, 
The golden circlets forged in pairs, 
The opal that a storm foreknows ; 
Oh ! pay the price a queen bestows 
For sweetest rue and rosemary. 

Love, dear Love in charity 
Buy of me my fading wares. 
So buy the wheat I tore from tares 
And buy my sacrificial woes, 
Pay me the joy that pity owes, 
Buying sweet rue and rosemary. 



167 



LIFE'S TRINITY 

I of earth have walked the million leagues 

That stretch from oceans to volcanic seas, 
Searching for Truth untrammelled with in- 
trigues, 
Truth, Grace and Power, Life's trinity in 
these. 

I of heaven have swept the peopled skies 
That cover all the world's encircling space. 

Searching for Truth that Honour satisfies, 
Life's trinity to find in Power, Truth and 
Grace. 



i68 



RATHER TO STORMS 

Rather to storms I bared my breast, 
Than with the leaf and flower to stay, 

Emotionless and still to rest, 
The insignificant dull day. 

Far rather I would phantoms chase 
And fail in this one tearful task, 

Than dreamless idleness to face, 

Or in sudden golden gleams to bask. 

So rather I would fight to win. 
To work, prevailing if I could, 

Or else God's woof of dreams to spin 
And live in this one regnant mood. 



169 



GREAT HEART 

Oh ! Great Heart of the merry times, 
When love's desire was sung in rhymes, 

The troubadour the tune to play : 
When doughty deeds were fought with darts. 
If resurrected now, what arts 

And weapons would you use today 

A warrior to kill and slay ? 

Would song be sung to sweet lute strings, 

The song of soft and gladsome things 
Or, swept away love's fair desire — 

The lust of passion in full sway, 

To cannonading would you play. 

And fight to kill with quick gunfire — 
The trumpet call your song to inspire? 



170 



NEW LIFE 

Smitten with silence is the snow, 
Burdened with ghostly secrecy, 

A spectre till the sun's warm glow 
Loosens, in tears, its mystery. 



171 



INSOMNIA 

Alone and sleepless in the crowding dark, 
To all its haunting wails I, trembling, hark, 
As no interpreter is there to say 
That they are prophets of the coming day. 

Some of joy's vanished dreams return to sing, 
Life's fair and momentary calm to bring. 
Remembered love once lays its peace on me. 
But from the noise of night I am not free. 

Such queer and surging things ring through the 
air, 

The quarrelling winds that would a prey en- 
snare, 

The restlessness among the stars sounds clear, 

The tumult of my thoughts I, even, hear. 

Oh, Sleep, why wait a single hour to say, 
That you will drive the clamouring night away, 
And leave me to the dark that safe will hold 
Me dreaming till the wings of day unfold. 



172 



A SUNBEAM TO THE FERN 

Oh, child of the patient forest, 

Thy tenderest breath is my balm, 
As I follow thy feet through wood-tangles, 

Through the leaf-buried mosses, through 
calm. 

I follow and haste to o'ertake thee, 

I appeal to thy shadow-hid heart. 
Hide not in new haunts, nor outrun me. 

In your beauty my love has a part. 



173 



SNOWFLAKES 

Winged as the day is, 

Silent as swift, 
Myriad snowflakes 

Falter then drift : 
Falter as thoughts might, 

Drift as the sands, 
When run through the fingers 

Of soft fondling hands. 

Winged as the day is, 

Who follows their lead? 
Who, loving them, stays them, 

Swift in their speed? 
Who steadies these children 

From dizzy heights whirled, 
Not one in a conflict 

As they fall to our world ? 



174 



THE OPAL 

Morning weaves a golden net 

Over your heart of snow, 
But curtains it with violet 

To shade the telltale glow. 

Then Noon in cunning jealousy- 
Sets snares to lure the rose 

To flash her golden sovereignty 
Where red your life blood flows. 

In ecstasy the Twilight weaves 

A net to hide the gold, 
Its green, the green of lakeside leaves, 

Kissing you fold on fold. 

Your jailers they, Morn, Noon, Twilight, 
Who keep you prisoned here, 

Your flaming heart of earth's delight. 
Your soul of Heaven's white sphere. 



175 



ECHOES 

Echoes, echoes, kiss then part, 
One a dream, a memory one. 

And on my sheltered beating heart 
Their unremitting race is run. 

Echoes, echoes, kiss then part, 

Unsilenced in their soundings save. 

The dream, the memory and the heart 
Lie unaware and in one grave. 



176 



WEDDED 

From hill and hill two streams are flowing, 
Each springing from the mountain's heart 

And down the valley, life bestowing, 
They journey on, each one apart. 

Till, suddenly, in swift surrender, 

They yield their separate ways and meet 

In single course, a forest splendour, 
Both wonder-fraught and wondrous fleet. 

In stricken Summer's arid weather. 
No stream allays her thirst or strife 

But, mountain-fed, two streams together, 
Freshen the earth as love does life. 



177 



SOUL AND SONG 

Allured from paradise, the breath 

Of Morning woke and sweet as strong 

Kissed wan, consenting space to fill 
Its emptiness with soul and song. 



178 



PHOSPHORESCENCE 

Suddenly breaking, the unaware mist 
Drops a star where the night-shadow kissed, 
Kissed the sea. 
Can it be 
That it falls to a grave 
(The encompassing wave), 
There to brighten its lustreless dark? 
Fair as gold. 
Just as cold, 
Falls a spark ? 
The foam billows it kissed, 
Green, rose, amethyst. 
Then like to deep crimson the glow. 
As restless as longing, alluring its might; 
'Tis a promise to mermen, a torch, wonderlight 
From dusk to the dawn 'tis a pilot full bold, 
'Tis the glint of Heaven's glory we mortals can 
hold 
In one hand, 'neath a wavelet in flow. 



179 



TRANSFIGURED 

Kissing the sea, a snowflake dies, 
Clad in a shroud, a pearl it lies, 
A new-born soul its heaven begun. 

A snowflake dies, by sunshine kissed. 
Falling a tear, a pearl in mist, 
A vanished soul, its heaven won. 



i8o 



THE SEA 

As old in wisdom as in reign, 
A sweet serenity I feign, 
For I must murder if I toil 
And take a friendly life for spoil. 

I feign — then passion heat is white, 
With savage arms the earth I smite. 
The heartbeats of the world I hear, 
Each throb the wilder for its fear. 

Then o'er dead beauty I am borne, 
Unrest of cruelty is shorn, 
And quick the smile of one fair hour 
Awakes from wreckage, laughter, flower. 



i8i 



A BROKEN PROMISE 

The sleepy sun once said good-night, 
A farewell lingering and sweet; 

I heard his message to the world, 
"Tomorrow we shall smiling meet." 

But broken was his promise fair 
For long it was before they met; 

Dark days of weeping and despair 
Made each the other quite forget. 



182 



VISTAS 

Dusk is the leaden mist that flows 

Through tawny hours beyond our sight, 

Veiling the vistas, vision-fraught, 
Where loved and lost ones reunite. 



183 



THE STARS 

Looking over hill and heather, 

Looking over drift and haze, 
Looking where the tempests gather, 

Straight into the stars we gaze, 

Dazzling in their far off splendour; 

Sovereigns are they, old or new? 
Subjects are they, cruel, tender? 

Children are they, fickle, true? 

Would they mate with joy or sorrow. 
Learn to love and faithful grow? 

Are they alien to the morrow, 

And their own death can they foreknow? 

Ranging over desolation. 

Ranging over leagues of change, 

Have they journeyed since creation? 
Are they friendly, are they strange ? 

Heaven is girdled with their glory 

And the smiling of their eyes 
Tells to the world the simple story 

Of the angels* paradise. 



184 



THE GARDEN OF DEATH 

Touching the waste in the kindness 
That Nature conveys to the old, 

The Seasons o'erlay the bare tombstones 
With protecting snow-mantles, sun-gold. 

They overgrow graves with sweet wilderness, 

Interposing the flower or leaf, 
Then peril and death are forgotten. 

For gladness o'ercovers Love's grief. 



185 



THE WORLD RUNS AWAY 

Hark, the world runs away ! 
Overrolling it goes 
(And the sun overthrows), 

Over-zealous, astray. 

The world runs away, 

Startling nights till they wake, 
Coaxing moons to forsake 

Heaven's haunts for mere play. 

Hark, the world runs away ! 

Topsy-turvy the stars. 

As leaping it jars, 
Is it drunken or gay ? 

The world runs away ! 
To the morrow it goes 
And spent with heart throes. 

There to rest for a day. 



1 86 



GOD'S LULLABY 

Thrilled is the nebulous twilight 

When the tremulous zephyr floats by, 

The wind that is Heaven's first breathing, 
Its loitering, exquisite sigh. 

Still is the once troubled gloaming 
When the unsustained melodies die, 

When, fallen in dreams, dreams of angels, 
We sleep to God's sweet lullaby. 



187 



THE PRINCESS OF SUMMER 

Laden with self -ensnared plunder, 
The surfeit on wings to be seen, 

The bee is a princess of summer 
Of myriad blossoms the queen. 

For roses, the wonder of waysides, 
Have paid her in tithes of pure gold, 

Twice yielding her money in dewdrops, 
Which the generous petals uphold. 

Of silver there's never too little 

For this tyrant to steal from pale flowers, 
Lily-flowers who, wan as the moonbeams, 

Are swooning in overwarm hours. 

No sombre dressed flower escapeth 

Paying toll in the sugary coin. 
Which is booty to greedy bee-sovereigns. 

Who even from paupers purloin. 

A jovial princess of summer 

And the cleverest thief is the bee, 

For despoiling June's kingdom of silver 
As of gold hath she honey in fee. 



1 88 



RIVERS AND ROBINS 

Who dares confess to loneliness 

When the clay is filled with insect life, 

When the rivers swish, when all the world 
Is with happy, winged creation rife, 

When the channelled earth breaks out in noise 

In the forest lutes to sing its joys ? 

If overhead and underfoot 

Are myriad melodies astir, 
If rivers and the robins praise, 

Soul-peace in song to minister, 
Then, Love apart, these comrades left, 
Who could of friends be all bereft ? 



189 



WHERE SWEET IS REST 

The tiny elves are dwelling 
In gardens where the bush 

Changes from white in moonbeams, 
To red in noontime's flush. 

There butterflies are brooding 
And bees are half asleep, 

Proud poppies and pale pansies 
Their patient vigil keep. 

The earth is sweet with balsam, 
With petunias that stray 

Entangled in the iris. 

Fair guardian of the way. 

And here a lone sundial 

Spells time and counts the hours. 
By slow and pleasant shadows, 

Fallen first amidst the flowers. 

There ask and songs will answer 

In lullabies low heard, 
The winds in happy whispers, 

A crooning mother bird. 
190 



Where Sweet is Rest 191 

A trembling tree that s traightens, 

A melody confessed, 
In all the place low music, 

Soothing where sweet is rest. 



NATURE'S MELODIES 

In the swinging of the scythe, 
In the cricket's tune so blithe, 

The soft and minor melodies abound; 
While the surgings of the sea, 
That are restless, wild in glee, 

Wake cadences and harmonies profound. 

All unmuffled notes and free 

These new melodies must be, 
Voicing symphonies that softly blend. 

Thus the whispers of the lea 

And the booming of the sea 
Are married in the songs that never end. 



192 



NATURE'S BEST 

Beguiled by every simple thing 

That rooted grows, 

Or blooming glows, 
(The road betrayed by birds on wing. 

By flashing gleams 

And friendly streams), 
I follow, treasures home to bring 

Of Nature's best 

And loveliest. 



U 193 



THE JUNE RAIN 

It runs along the verdant ways, 

And sweeps an unused tangled path, 

For all the folk who haunt the May, 
For every sprite the June-time hath. 

They listen to the drip on drip 

Whose singing has a silvered tongue. 

They catch the raindrops lip to lip. 
In revelry the flowers among. 

As merrily they play and dance, 
The nodding grasses sway in tune, 

The rhythmic raindrops but enhance 
The music of the May and June. 



194 



A BIRD OUT OF THE NEST 

Strange to liberty I wait 

For many days to pass, ere I 
Can cry, "All's well, " and then elate 

Swift with the early winds to fly; 

Swift with the winds to fly and dare 

To graze a danger as in play, 
To cry, ''All's well," though storms be there. 

My freedom gained in one glad day. 



195 



THE RAIN 

Swift fall the rushing raindrops 
When Spring has called them here, 

To flood the earth full measure 
And bring the flower-days near. 

And soft they fall when summer 

Sips first the filling wells, 
That Autumn shall have dower, 

Of blossoms this foretells. 

When Winter would be quaffing 
Sweet drink, the rain is shy, 

The wind-blown year is sterile. 
Grim frozen is the sky. 



196 



THE MOON 

Soul of the summer night, the moon 
Sleeps in the arms of afternoon, 
Sleeps in the over-purpling haze. 
Ready to light earth's darkest ways, 

When the day is done, 

And when one by one, 
Voices of land and sea are dead. 

Soul of the summer night, the moon 
Silvers the silences of June; 
Dimmest of tearful eyes than see. 
See ghosts that haunt the flowered lea, 

Then the hurt hearts hear. 

And fair heaven is near, 
June's in the night, earth's griefs are fled. 



197 



GLAD HEART OF ME 

The falling blossoms of the May 
Take flight and sail across the day, 
A cool white cloud against the sky, 
Then glad the heart of me, I cry. 

Soft kissing sighs the woods forsake 
And skimming leas new life intake; 
Then all the breathing world is sweet. 
Glad heart of me — the May I greet. 

Then Love comes early, coming fair, 
And who to cross his mood would dare? 
Not I, all mine the magic May, 
Glad heart of me, — I seek Love's sway. 



198 



WANTON WEATHER 

With hearts attuned to gracious spring 

In shading tree-tops birds, a-wing, 

Sweet sing 

And say, 

Which way 

Is wanton weather, which way still ? 

Will wanton weather hurt or kill ? 

The wanton weather 

Is where the heather, 

Is where the young, affrighted grass, 

And where the mating lovers pass. 

With hearts attuned to frowning spring 

In far-off tree-tops birds, a-wing, 

Still sing 

And say 

Which way 

The wanton weather, what care we — 

Though storms are rife we yet are free. 

Naught can stay 

Our roundelay, 

Nor stifling hinder our long flight, 

Naught save the deep obscuring night. 



199 



EARTH CHANGED TO PARADISE 

The Spring but sips the dewdrops 

And splendour is in reign 
The colour-riot golden, 

Sweet sound the one refrain. 

Then bathed by wanton tempests 
That gathered in one night, 

Spring still reveals new marvels 
That charm the sense, the sight. 

Is Spring the one creator 
Whose soul is born of tears, 

Whose self revives in glory 
From desolating years ? 

Who else could gather memories 
Turned grey by tearful eyes, 

And nurse them till their sunshine 
Changes earth to paradise? 



200 



NATURE 

So sweet her poise, so wise her ways 
That she but hoards her happy days: 
No single one of this fair time 

The day that you and I would waste 
In spoiling reason or a rhyme 

By overheat or overwaste: 
She hoards them so true joys endure 
In the mellowed magic of her lure. 



20 1 



YEARNING 

In desolate far loneliness, 

A Fir-tree calls for love to come 

And friendly be, to comfort, bless 
And find within her arms a home. 

A robin hears the plaintive cry, 
And summoning his mate, his kin, 

An autocrat, he bids them fly, 
And haste the moving to begin. 

He bids them lay their nesting young 
Within the Fir-tree's yearning arms; 

Then chattering in mystic tongue. 

They rest there safe from earth's alarms. 

And thus the Fir-tree truly mates 
With sweet and longed-for happiness; 

Love called, will come for love creates 
Friends who comfort, cheer and bless. 



202 



ALMOST 

The gardener saves the Rose he crushed, 

Though crushed her wings till almost stilled; 

The throbbing heart is almost hushed, 
Crippling the soul he almost killed. 

He saves the Rose who almost dies 

Reproaching him with sad hurt eyes. 

The gardener saves the Rose and holds 

Her dearer for her broken wings. 
In sheltering love her heart enfolds 

As to her fainting soul he clings; 
Clings closer for the poor hurt eyes 
Reproaching still in sad surprise. 



203 



EARLY MORNING 

Not knowing any other way, 
I come and from long silence fly 

From outer darkness to the day, 
The flight in summer mood, a sigh. 

In still content my spirit falls 
Upon a sleeping, dreaming earth ; 

In one sweet note a love-bird calls 
A welcome to my solemn birth. 

And wide the path that I must cross — 
Where all the world is sweet in flower, 

Where hearts are gay, where life is loss. 
These each I kiss in my brief hour. 

Not knowing any other way. 
And but a wanderer since birth. 

Unasked, unthanked, I come to lay 
A fair and fearless smile on earth. 



204 



BETRAYED 

In silence was the dreaming night betrayed, 
'Twas when the stars were courting sweet the 
moon: 

Each satellite a quick obeisance made, 

Then slipped away soft-shod in silvered shoon. 

The love of which moon's beauty wove the lure 
But faded near the heart that blazoned light 

And, loyal once again, the stars sought sure — 
The slumberous and siren arms of night. 



205 



DANCING 

In spring's early rushing wind 
The tendrils of the vine 
Sway merrily, 
Sing cheerily; 
In the vexing wind, unkind, 
The little tendrils pine. 
Sigh wearily, 
Die drearily. 

But the summer wind 

Is kind, 
And merrily it plays. 
So cheerily it sways 
The little leaving trees, 
Quick dancing in the breeze. 

And this tuneful wind 

Is kind, 
Sets to a dancing beat 
The nodding flowers sweet, 
Sets dancing wistful trees 
To the music of the breeze. 
206 



Dancing 207 

So 'tis ever kind, 
This wind, 
For it keeps the world of flowers 
In a dancing mood for hours, 
Keeps the happy trees soft sighing. 
With the dancing wind undying. 



BIRDS 

Travellers on-winging and far flying they, 
Over and over the world's weeping way ; 
Skimming the ocean's ensnaring long arm, 
Circling the meadow, the woodland, the farm, 
Illusive and never in nesting to stay — 
Revellers calling their fellows to play. 
Squandering joys in bewildering waste, 
Love and adventure wild-longing to taste. 

Promising laughter in rhythmic refrain. 
Trilling surpassingly through the cold rain, 
Filling the solitude's vastness with song. 
Dwelling wherever the world-sirens throng. 
Satisfied wanderers, fondest of dawn 
Yet following shadows, the sunlight withdrawn, 
Under the drowsy old moon fall asleep, 
In dreamland new songs and new wonders to 
reap. 



208 



MASQUERADING 

A moonbeam masquerades a bit 
And plays the silly harlequin, 

And posing for a flirt, a wit. 

Coquets with maids, the woods within. 

A haughty posture takes, then speeds 
His frisking feet so far, so fast 

He stumbles 'mid the tangled reeds, 
Thus in obscurity is cast. 

Night spreads her shadows over him. 
This fellow who would have his fling, 

His misty glory now is dim, — 

He sought but pranks and pleasuring. 



14 209 



THE NIGHTINGALE 

While summer barkens back to snow- 
Remoter moods than I can know, 
I'm rocking in the leafy trees 
The harmonies of earth to seize, 
These learning, blend them in one tune, 
Paean of joy, glad song to June. 



THE PEACOCK 

Enamoured of himself, in proud estate 
And amorous, in sense elate, 
He struts a-nigh a bramble fence, 
Vain, in lone magnificence. 

Just over there 'mid flowers a-bloom, 
In waiting lies his unguessed doom. 

A love-call sends his flying feet 
His gracious kissing mate to meet, 
But as he would his joy dispense, 
He stumbles on the bramble fence. 

His wings all torn and bruised his pride, 
Must he there await his wailing bride. 



211 



FALLEN LEAVES 

Dear truants fled from Safety -land, 
The leaves adrift, 
The Autumn's gift 

Soft fallen to my loving hand : 
With draggled wings, 
The plaintive things, 

As captives, laid there satisfied : 
I loved them so. 
Hearts beating slow, 

Ere lost from Safety-land they died. 



212 



WANTED 

The mating star, he sought his heart's desire 
And sought it by the moon's revealing fire; 

His wings unfurled, 

Around the world 
He went, not measuring the circling way; 

He chose to go. 

In flight so slow, 
That round he went till lost in one white day. 

You swains, take heed 

Your race to speed 
If you would overtake your heart's desire 
And keep your love in Life's quick burning fire. 



213 



THE CLOUD 

Whoso is sure, more sure than I 
Of solitude, high must he fly — 

Must have a care 

For Heaven's great glare. 
Yet fear earth's mystery the more; 
The lightning flash that goes before 

The thunderbolt, 

Day's quick revolt 
From too much petting of the sun: 
And he must run from storms begun. 

The devil in 

The race to win. 

Whoso is more than I, but sure 
That earth's long solitudes endure. 

Is but a fool, 

The witless tool 
Of tempests playing in the wild, 
But, kin to me, he's Nature's child. 



214 



THE WILLOWS 

By zephyrs swung and rocked are we 

^ Over the brooding grass asleep, 
Spreading our wings all tenderly 
Over the fairies watch to keep. 

Gladdest of guardians, dear of heart. 
Saving the nests of roving years. 

Kissing the frightened birds that dart 

Through the dew shadows, wet with tears. 

Fairest of havens, safe and true, 

Shelter to sheep of warm fleece shorn, 

Shield to a comrade, such as you, 
Friend to a foe, if spent and worn. 



215 



BLOSSOM-SUITORS 

In locking arms for safety's sake, 
The pear and cherry trees are wed ; 

Think you, birds, who brown nests make 
Where leafy branches overspread, 

That you, and only you, are there, 

Innocent and debonair? 

Gallants there are who soon espy 

You laughing, as they come too near, 

Too near the place where you defy 
These suitors of the blossomed year; — 

These butterflies and hungered bees. 

Who with you share the flowered trees. 



216 



THE HEART OF THE WORLD 

In the heart of the world 

Is the flame of gold ; 
'Tis in petals unfurled, 

*Tis in leaf in fold. 

In earth's chalice of rose 

Is the red of wine ; 
Through the morning it flows 

And its heart is mine. 

In the heart of a maid 

Is the flame of gold ; 
*Tis her smile sweet betrayed, 

*Tis her secret told 

In her chalice of rose 

Is the red of wine. 
Through my soul quick it flows— 

And Love's heart is mine. 



217 



THE RAINBOW 

Red of reds, the rainbow's heart, 
Orange flames in fire apart, 

Yellow's smile turns tears to gold, 
Green the herald of Spring's fold, 
Blue unites the morn and night 
Indigo's dark bloom despite, 
Violet, the loving thing, 

In harmony rain-tears to bring. 

i?ainbow. in the heaven caught, 
Of your gold is gold unbought, 
Fours the sweet untroubled face 

Given in promise of God's grace. 
By your sign that men may know 
In earth's dark that no floods flow: 
Fain, — to storms unreconciled, 

Of rain you are the one sun-child. 



218 



HEAT LIGHTNING 

Through all the world a cloud I ride, 
A cloud the chariot I guide, 
With winged steeds of fire and flame, 
And, into safety, drive them, tame. 



219 



IN ARCADIE 

While walking in the wake of May, 
The underthrust of grass I feel 
If chance I stoop or humbly kneel 

To drink the honey-dews that stay 
Upon the hps of daffodils : 
The drink is spiced warm and thrills 

Aly soul with Springtime and her lure, 

I wonder will her dreams endure, — 

The dreams unbosomed by the May 

Who smiles when mellowed morn is near, 
When brooding clouds withhold the tear, 

In shadow days or days of play 

Her heart brews nectar golden sweet, 
Her breast the open safe retreat 

For any wounded, winged thing, 

The too quick harbinger of spring. 

With all too hostile winds at bay, 
May dips her vernal wing to shield 
And feather green the barren field. 

Then as her perfume scents the way, 
To heaven-cloistered Arcadie, 
The mistress of my soul to be, 

I'll follow Springtime and her lure 

And dwell where siren-dreams endure. 



220 



SONG TO A SONG 

Swift from the sobbing sea a song is sung, 
Singing its way the cooing birds among — 
Sung in sweet tongue. 

Quick from my heart to you a throb is sent, 
Fluttering soft with siren-music blent, 
Song in song spent. 

Song of the sea is still, with birds asleep, 
Song of the heart its melody will keep, 
Though the world weep. 

Song to a song, with Love to sing the tune, 
Heart to a heart with saddened worlds a-swoon, 
This is Life's boon. 



221 



EVERYWHERE AND NOWHERE 

Won by sunshine, I must follow 
• The summer's road that leads 
To Everywhere and Nowhere, 

The road where naught impedes 
My progress to the highlands 

Whose peaks are crowned with gold, 
The road that leads to lowlands, 

With mortals in the fold. 

Won by sunshine, I must follow 

The road that wends its way 
To Everywhere and Nowhere, 

Beyond the dauntless day : 
Risen to heights transcendent 

I pierce Heaven's blue and see 
Visions of dear immortals 

Starring Eternity. 



SWEET SILENCES 

Night lays its dark upon the world, 
Then dreams awake with wings unfurled, 
Drifting adown the quiet way 
Their first caress on love to lay. 

Sweet silences wherein we brood, 
No fitful glamour in the mood, 
But just a patient hope to rest 
Upon the earth's unravaged breast. 

Then dreams enfold their wings to keep 
A shelter safe for those asleep, 
Assuaging pain if such there be 
In life and love's deep mystery. 



223 



THE BROOK 

Have you caught the pure heart of the mountain 
And the fleeting white soul of the wood? 

Caught the spirits that dwell in the forests, 
Caught the laggards who pleading withstood? 

Have you held them as one on your bosom, 
On your sparkling and sheltering breast ? 

There, luring the leaf and young flower, 
Of what sweeter thing now is your quest ? 

Do these spirits seem fugitive children 
That endeared live again in your life? 

Your companions in highways and byways 
Hand in hand in your struggle and strife ? 

The strife to encompass the journey 

Into wonderland then to the sea? 
Little Brook, if desiring new friendships, 

Many mortals your conquests would be. 

Then with you would travel forgetting 
That they die in the rustling onrush 

To the grasping and once restless ocean 
Slow and sleeping in midsummer's hush. 



224 



SPIRITS OF THE WOODLANDS 

Plumaged red, 

Brown o'erspread, 
Sweet spirits of the woodlands; 

He and she, 

Songsters free, 
They roam where I may never; 

Vagrant wings, 

Little things, 
They vanish 'neath the skylands. 

Of earth I, 

Till I die, 
I may not haunt the woodlands, 

I must die 

Ere I fly 
My wings the clouds to sever. 

I must fly 

Ere my sigh 
Can pierce the dark veiled skylands. 

Vagrant wings, 

Little things. 
Sweet spirits of the woodlands; 
IS ^25 



226 Spirits of the Woodlands 

Songsters free, 

Together we, 
Some day and then for ever, 

On may fly, 

Far on high 
In quest of hidden skylands. 



WANDERLUST 

Following the call of the siren, 

Filled with wanderlust just in one day, 

The wee snowdrops left kin and the homeland 
So to seek a new world far awa}^ 

Not a tear was there shed at the parting 
From their neighbours, the century old, 

With a whizz and a whirr and with rapture 
They but scurried and rushed from the fold. 

In the struggle they fell in a hurry 
And fast covered the city and field, 

Hiding white the far crag and the valley, 
Till the grime of each one was concealed. 

But afraid of the world and its offspring 
And of all that its warfare portends, 

In the journey was wanderlust sated. 

So soon homesick they cried for old friends. 

Then too late came the pitiful longing. 

As they wept that on earth they must stay 

For so brief was the unwilling sojourn 
That they died as they came, in one day. 



227 



THE SERAPH 

God gave the bird his song to bring 

The quiet day to early Hfe, 
Then gave the day a voice to sing 

To stir the world to noise and strife. 
God gave the seraph song that he 

In ranging o'er the noise of day 
Could master of all songsters be, 

And with his soul the erring sway. 

The bird, the day, the seraph sing 
In melodies that vibrant ring. 
Echoes of Heaven on earth to bring. 



228 



THE WORLD'S ECHO 

His sponsor once forsaken, 

The dauntless echo falls 
'Twixt harmony and hades; 

Persistently he calls 
To all the ruling spirits 

Of peopled worlds to hear 
His early proclamation 

Though distant, sounding clear. 

His sponsor was the old year, 

A sacrifice to storms 
And torn and tried by old loves 

The echo with him mourns, 
Yet sternly issues mandates 

To the innocent New Year, 
To face world-tides and tempests, 

A sturdy pioneer. 



239 



ALL TREMULOUS WITH TEARS 

Earth calls the Day, all tremulous with tears 
And bids her lay her misery and fears 
Upon the new and swift encroaching years; 
To lay the burden there, 
Forgotten as a care, 
But spoken as a prayer, 
A prayer for skies where love the shadow clears 
Of sorrow unaware. 



230 



FASCINATING FANNIE 

I strove my best to guard and please her, 

This maiden born of sunny climes, 
Sportive at first I tried to tease her, 

And then to teach at different times 
The latest word or silly notion, 

Now taught in any modern school; 
'Twas learned but learned with much com- 
motion 

And for my pains she dubbed me fool. 

Then if she roamed, 'twas in a flutter, 

When hobbling in ungainly haste, 
And when she talked, it was to splutter 

Some epithets not to my taste. 
One day she called, "I faint, come fan me," 

Yet shrieked it with a piercing yell, 
This wayward fascinating Fannie, 

The taunting parrot you know well. 



231 



NATURE 

Sleepless guardian of my fold, 
Feeblest on my breast I hold, 

Mightiest I keep at bay: 
Ancestors nor kin have I 
Battling for supremacy — 

Born Creator, worlds I sway. 



232 



DRIFTS AND DRIFTS 

Like clouds that nestle in the valleys 

In safe enclosing arms to rest, 
Are drifts and drifts of leaves down falling, 

Unbidden guests on earth to nest. 

Like little flocks of birds home flitting 

Of tender mothering in quest, 
Are drifts and drifts of songs far winging 

To sink at last in Love's fair breast. 

If one among them soft is singing 
Its heart appeal made manifest, 

Of drifts and drifts of dreams beguiling, 
Oh Love, keep mine the nearest, best. 



233 



DEWDROPS 

Unwilling in their earthward flight, 
Soft fall the shadow-tears of night, 
Impaled on blades of grass they stay, 
Cool witnesses to watch the day. 

Alas ! that tears of bleeding night 
Pass on in still and willing flight, 
Not e'en their ghosts be left to stay, 
Waiting to watch another day. 



234 



THE CARDINAL BIRD 

Red throated and his breast aflame, 
A wanderer down winter's way, 

He traced the thin white road with shame 
Because, was stilled his roundelay. 

For worn of heart and w^orn of wing 

He could not, could not sweetly sing. 

He could not sing that tired day, 
His scarlet wing so weak and worn, 

His heart snow-withered on the way, 
His spirit sinking and forlorn, 

But once he heard the call of spring, 

He could not wait his song to sing. 



235 



WAITING 

The tree long waited for the leaf 
That fashioned her a splendid dress, 
To hide her heart so none could guess 

That in it lay a spoiling grief. 

So life waits long as waits the tree, 
For grace to fashion her the dress, 
To clothe her heart with loveliness 

So none its car king pain can see. 



236 



THE MOUNTAIN STREAM 

I am long in the land where unbidden, 

Unchidden, 
I am leading, yet led, where I follow 

The hollow, 
And I venture the way once in hushing, 

Then rushing, 
Till soon in the forest, in finding 

Its winding, 
I am whirled mid the rocks in a dashing 

And splashing, 
That is ending my day as a bubble 

In trouble. 



237 



THE FOREST 

In the vastness of great shadow 

Is the forest half asleep, 
Till the dawn wakes up the silence 

And is stirring winds to keep 
All the little leaves a-rustling 
All the little brooks a-hustling 

While the sky is blue and keep. 

Would you keep the woods in shadow 

Or keep the sun in glow, 
Would you have the forest quiet 

Or the winds that, rustling, blow 
All the leaves, till set a-nodding, 
And the brooks alive and throbbing 

With no quiver in them slow? 

I would have the world in shadow, 
So that there I'd dream by day, 

Then I'd have it swift and glowing, 
Thus to see the winds at play. 

I would have the winds a-sleeping, 

Then I'd have them watchful keeping, 
Both dreams and shadows well away. 



238 



THE EARTH 

The wind, the sea, the sun, the moon, the star 
Alike my teachers and my servants are. 
So I, the monarch, menial none the less. 

But nurture them as so they nurture me. 
Yet beings of no stunted littleness, 

Humbly we serve one King — one Deity. 



239 



THE EARLY DAWN TO THE SUN 

Impatiently I wait the waking of the hours, 
The hours awake with winds astir 'mid flowers, 
The Daffodils, sweet unafraid, though bent with 

dew. 
And waiting for this boon I wait for you, 
The sweetheart of one day, 
The sweetheart of my play. 

The play that of the rugged world am I, 
Won by its sudden glories, glory to woo; 

Sweetheart! Sweetheart! To Heaven I raise my 
cry,— 
Will you to me one perfect day be true? 

Tenderly laughing to lead me on and on, 
Unnoticing the way save for its flowers, 

The trembling Daffodils with dew bent down. 
Flowers wakened with me when woke the 
radiant hours. 



240 



THE BURIED VOLCANO 

Long time stilled in the earth 's deepest silence, 
Not a witness to tell of my might. 

My quick heart has a secret in keeping, 
Not a flame of its fire in sight. 

Sleep you well, all you trouble-worn children, 
Come as close as you will to my breast, 

Not a flash of my luminous passion 
Shall be startling your dreamless, sweet rest. 

Could you guess at my tireless mercy, 

You would know that in hoarding m.y power. 

My one sceptre to life I am yielding 
So to spare you sleep's comforting hour. 



i6 241 



WHEN SPRING COMES 

Gathering glad days from the cold, 
Spring comes, in birth denying death. 
Strenuous, sweet, life-giving breath, 

To quicken hearts, both new and old. 



242 



EARLY APRIL " 

A wanderer is April, 

A mendicant in rags, 
Shivering, bent and craven, 

With sombre mien she lags. 

She sees the naked tree-tops. 
Where nesting birds would go, 

Were not the wood in sadness, 
Its leaf o'erlaid with snow. 

Her plaint ascends to Heaven, 
She cries for smiling days. 

Her prayer is sudden answered. 
Flower-strewn the radiant ways. 

In leaf the hundred tree-tops 
Where nesting birds safe sleep, 

And sunbeams foster harvests 
That the sowers soon will reap. 



243 



SPRING'S INCENSE 

Could I wrest from the mountains their secrets, 
What beauty would lie at my feet ? 

Earth's fire, that burning spring incense, 
Would escape in a breath heather-sweet. 

And then if this comforting perfume 
Would caress me with happ}^ intent, 

'Twoiild conquer my grief and complaining, 
'Twould master my soul-discontent. 



244 



APRIL 

After laughter, overtearful, 

After grieving, overgay, 
Over sad then over cheerful, 

Changeful April kisses May. 

Kisses when the winds are sleeping, 
Kisses when the buds unfold, 

Kisses, whether glad or weeping. 
Whether da}^ is young or old. 

Loving April, mad or saddened, 

Over grieved or overgay, 
Springtime would not blossom gladdened, 

If you kissed not, kissing May. 



245 



JUNE DAYS 

June days are made by magic 
Inciting to speech the trees. 

June days are made by music 
Thrilling the birds and breeze. 

June days are made by mystery, 
Mysteries of love — all these. 

Ah, loveliest these, the June days 
Sweet with the singing bird, 

Breeze-whispers mellowing sadness, 
Hearts to the joy-time stirred. 

Yea, quickening Love to completeness, 
June's lure is in music heard. 



246 



EXPECTANCY 

Heaven be kind and kiss the snow 
With May-time and the happy sun, 

That I may feel the Spring and know 
Expectancy in life begun. 



247 



MARCH 

March is master of poor April, 
A captive cowering and bent, 

In wrath he breaks her trees in budding, 
Whereof the leaf a greeting sent ; 

The little tender word of springtime 
Was punished for its first content. 

March is master of poor April, 
Who hurt yet sweet again beguiles. 

Forgiving March and with fresh ardour 
She flashes smiles on smiles ; 

Her unrestrained contentment wakened 
She radiates earth's miles on miles. 



348 



MAY TO JUNE 

May held a joy within her breast 
Unafraid yet unconfessed: 
Held it fast till June came near, 
Alluring with her smile and tear. 

Said May to June, "For love all true, 
My best bloom I kept back for you, 
That yours should be the laughing flower 
And yours the perfumed, perfect hour. " 



249 



SPRING'S JEWELS 

Threaded on a cobweb, 
Shine dewdrops in the sun, 

A necklace strung for Springtime, 
Whose garments are gold-spun. 

She decks herself in jewels 
That sparkle in sea-spray, 

Their myriad rainbow colours, 
The, glowing glints of day. 

The moon-white curling tendrils 
From flower-vines she stems, 

To lay them on her tresses. 
Woven in diadems. 

And everywhere is treasure, 
Spilled far by thieving winds 

Who stole from heaven the amber,- 
The sapphires that she finds. 

Gems gleam in golden showers. 
In crystals light the gloom. 

They star the waiting flowers 
Wherever earth has room. 



250 



MIDWINTER 

His arms are full and overheavy 
With cold that ages stored away, 

The cold that threads the mountain fissures, 
That turns the singing forest grey. 

Upon his brain no love-impression 

That wakes o'erwhelming heart desire, 

No hot, pursuing master-passion 
To melt his frozen soul with fire. 

All ignorant of tender memories. 

Not curious of what might be. 
Sublimely staunch is old midwinter, 

From self-effacing weakness free. 



251 



DEAR MIDSUMMER 

Ah, who could know the secrets hid 
Far deep in dear midsummer's heart? 

One delves not there — the gods forbid 
That we should steal her mystic art. 

No hesitating hand is hers 

While poppy-red she paints the field, 
And on the ocean soft confers 

The blue by cloudless skies revealed. 

She skirts the fragrant sleeping woods 
And buries there the sweet-pea pod, 

Then, in her more triumphant moods 
She flaunts the stately goldenrod. 

Midsummer, I must ever burn 
A lover's incense at your shrine. 

Your mystic art I may not learn 
But let your ravishments be mine. 



252 



SUMMER DAYS 

When summer days are waning, 
The vagrant shadows pass, 

As weird and spectral shadows 
They haunt the dew-wet grass. 

When living leaves are stricken 
And dies the singing bird. 

There's pathos in the moaning 
With subtle anguish stirred. 

When summer days are waning, 
Dear Love, are you awake. 

Or with the shadows failing 
Does soul your life forsake? 



253 



THE OLD, OLD STORY 

In glowing leaf that interlaces 
October gathers sheen and graces 

From Summer's dead the echoing hosts ; 
*Tis afterglow, the old, old, story, 
Death's uttermost and then — a glory; 

The conqueror displacing ghosts. 



254 



AUGUST 

Inhaling passion with the scents 
Uprising from the marsh or fen, 

My love is spent on innocents — 
On flower-hearts, on hearts of men. 

Then wearied with this joy, I run 
Athwart the glowing boundary 

Of summer gone and fall begun, — 
The high built wall of mystery. 

And then my ministries of faith 

Lie dead in Autumn's grasping hand; 

In meadow-mist I fade a wraith, 
Passing at Autumn's high command. 



255 



SPRING IS HERE 

A quiver of a leaf in budding, 

An hour soft, golden-eyed and clear, 

A flash of scarlet in the greening, 
A wing of blue and Spring is here — 

Spring is here and hearts are holding 
All the magic of its day, — 

Holding fragrance sweet infolding 
Safe laid away, safe laid away. 



256 



THE RAIN OF MAY 

The soul of me crying through tears, 
My sorrow in telling is sorrow retold, 

The soul of me cold, 
When true to the heart of me I am but sad 
When earth is most glad — 
The soul of me crying through tears ! 

I'm a prophet, the first of God's seers, 
A prophet foretelling the bloom of the seed. 

Exotic or weed. 
Yet true to the heart of me I am but sad. 
When earth is most glad — 
A prophet, the first of God's seers! 

Because of my sorrow and tears. 
The seed and the bloom are the fruit of my fears, 

This year and all years ; 
For this though I'm sad I sometimes am glad 
That earth is gay clad 
Because of my sorrow and tears 



17 257 



A JUNE SONG 

Whatever winsome wiles I know, 

I learn them when the June winds blow, 

Kissing the sleeping buds to wakefulness : 
The little melting winds that scent 
The open space until forespent, 

Changing to bloom life's wilderness. 



258 



THE LEAF TO THE TREE 

First fruitage of the springtime, 

Free born, yet slave am I, 
Half willing in my bondage 

My birth to justify. 

I'd stay with you for ever 

My mothering green tree, 
Were not wild winds, wild waters 

Your foes, while friends to me. 

They tear me from your heart-strings, 

Then jubilant am I, 
While you are worn at parting, 

As far away I fly. 



259 



AUTUMN'S ARTISTRY 

In fervour is the work begun, 

When Autumn gilds the wheat in sheaf 
And drawing fire from the sun 

She lays its glory on her leaf. 

When Plenty paints the red on brown, 
The long last smile from summer won, 

Then light as flies the thistledown 
The Autumn's artistry is done. 



260 



SPRING 

Bear you blossoms that the tree 
In self expression, sweet, shall be, 
Or bear you bloom for beauty's sake, 
That earth may of its joy partake? 



261 



THE NORTH WIND 

Thousands of years in heaven 
Taught you no word of this, — 

Sighs with your voice to leaven, 
Softer the blooms to kiss. 

Naught have you done to save them, 
Longings that live in flowers, 

Kissing the souls God gave them, 
Watching their wasting hours. 

Yet are you life to Nations — 

Hope to the stifling trees, 
Soul to all sultry Creations, 

Spirit to sinking seas. 

Thousands of yesLVs in heaven 

Left you at heart a child, 
Angered though seven times seven, 

By love are you last beguiled. 



262 



THE EAST WIND 

As with a sword it rends the air, 
No sacrifice, in love defers, 

And of the fainting dead aware, 
It fills the ocean sepulchres 

With poison, pestilence and pain. 

With fury spending wrath in vain. 



263 



THE SOUTH WIND 

Flown from the world of dreaming, 
Whim of the wandering year, 

Lost in the golden gloaming, 
How did you find this sphere? 

You are the balm to oceans. 
Peace to the stars in fold, 

Answer to man's devotions. 
Prayer to a faith foretold. 

Ravished from heaven your smiling, 
You are earth's solace ftdfilled. 

Self to desire reconciling, 
Thrilling a day unthrilled. 

Soothed by your kiss, fair flowers 
The bloom of the happy year. 

Glad is this world of ours, 
Once you have found this sphere. 



264 



THE WEST WIND 

Oh, turn your fondest face to mine, 
That, in your fourfold soothing breath, 

Your pure white heart I may divine. 
Then die with you a willing death ; 

And, softly as a fading sigh. 

Homing heavenward with you fly. 



265 



A COMPASSIONATE LOVER 

With the North wind a-swirl in the tree-tops 

All the leaves are a-tremble with fear. 
With the West wind too fond and desiring 

Leaves are aging, are sallow and sere, 
And the East wind akin to the North wind 

On all leaves lays a withering blight, 
But the South wind has heart and caressing, 

It brings to the leaf -world delight. 

Though I shrink not from North winds aveng- 
ing, 

Nor from West winds which shrivel the 
weak, 
Nor would drop in the path of the East wind. 

'Tis the kissable South wind I seek. 
And 'tis far I would follow its leading, 

To the deeps I would go, there it goes, 
To dim heights I would fly, should it fly there, 

If I die may its wings o'er me close. 

If I die may its breath calm my moaning, 
Caressing may its heart for me bleed. 

May its arms hold me safe in the going, 
A compassionate lover in need. 

At the death bear me on to God's heaven. 
Hold me dear while my spirit is freed. 



266 



THE TEMPEST 

Of mighty winds I am the one — 
The freelance swung in space, 

And as a brave, his war begun, 
Running to conquer in the race, 

I sweep all weaklings from the air, 

Joy in my heart with their despair. 

Invincible, my arm I raise 

To seize the strong and whip the free, 
And fired with the fighter's craze, 

I battle with the angered sea. 
Yea, this I do— yet vanquished I 
With one bright glance adown the sky. 



267 



WHERE THE WIND BLOWS 

Blow oh ! winds and blow you well, 
Searching meadows, marsh or dell, 
Find you there each newborn thing, 
The violet or the lark whose wing 
Unfeathered is and so unspread, 
The lark safe nested in his bed. 

Blow oh! winds and soft in flight, 
Gather leaves to toss to Night 
To cover all these tender things 
Of flowered or soft feathered wings 
So sleep they safe abed, till dawn 
Wakens to find them winged and gone. 



268 



THE SONG OF THE WINDS 

Myriad songs are the songs of the winds, 

But the whistling of one on the city street 
Measures the music that springtime finds 
None too sweet, 
None too fleet 
For the child's dancing feet. 

True as the trilling of birds sings one, 

Lyrical soft in rhythmic rune. 
Melody soothing, yet quick begun 
Near the dune, 
Sets the tune 
For the footstep of June. 

Sung with a lilt the wind-song sings, 
Voicing a love that heart-peace brings, 
Yet the lute 
And the flute, 
Tuned aright for the gay, 
Sing no happier lay. 
Than the wind-song light sings 
For the dance of the day. 



269 



MY LADY DAFFODIL 

Love lurks in strange disguises, 
(In quick surprises 
I divine,) 
And in sunshine kisses, settles 
On your petals, 
Lady mine. 

Did you call Love to you guiding, 
All unchiding, 
To your lair? 
Did you find him round you reaching, 
Sweet beseeching, 
Find him fair? 



270 



THE EDELWEIS 

Shut in where Autumn's leafy glow 
May never reach, 
I keep 
Asleep 
Till snowdrops teach 
My heart to beat to weal or woe. 

Shut in where tumult never wakes, 
I never know 
The years 
Through tears, 
So 'tis not woe 
To blossom 'neath the kind snow-flakes. 



271 



LOVE-IN-THE-MIST 

'Mid flowers sweet-laden 
With favours sun-kissed, 

None so fair as the maiden 
Sweet Love-in-the-Mist. 

And could I but paint her, 
Paint fire in her eyes. 

Her face no less quainter, 
She would waken heart-wise. 

But the butterfly lover 

Who, amorous, bold. 
Seeks her eyes to discover 

Finds them chiding and cold. 

When his heart he confesses, 
Then shrinking her mien 

As she sinks 'neath her tresses 
Of feathery green. 

Oh long have you waited, 
My Love-in-the-Mist, 

For suitors unhated; 
Why in waiting persist? 



272 



THE VIOLET 

Crushed in my hand a violet lies, 

With her vanishing breath what falters and 

dies ? 
What lay in her heart pent up too long? 
What was born as she died? Was it sorrow or 

song? 

Crushed in my hand a violet lies, 
Who in watching her vanishing breath is wise? 
I look for her soul in its heavenward flight, 
I see it. Can you with immortal sight? 



i8 273 



WHO KNOWS? 

Who knows 
That this purpled dust was once a rose, 

The rose 
That in Love's fertile garden grows? 

Her heart 

Knew grief, 

So fell the leaf 

From leaf apart, 
And, certain of her woe, who cares? 
To probe her death who would, who dares ? 



374 



THE SCARLET GERANIUM 

In her heart 
Is the light and the Hfe of the Morning, 
In her eyes is the flash of Noon-fire. 

Whose the art, 
The full flame in her heart and eyes scorning, 
To change white her resplendent attire? 

In her heart, 
Is Love's passion, the scarlet compelling, 
Whose the art that shall hold it in thrall? 

Whose the art ? 
Who tells me I'll pay for the telling, 
With the gold that the sunshine lets fall. 



275 



CLOVERS 

Happiness drunk in with dew, 

The clovers into rovers grew, 

Illusive errant creatures they 

Went happily afar to lay 

Their young where nesting things had been, 

The soft green feathered grass within. 

So rovers for all time they stay, 
Each year to haunt some alien way 
And where in clans they gathering meet 
There all the world is honey-sweet ; 
And zephyrs, from the sea-kissed wood, 
Taste the sweet dew and find it good. 



276 



THE PIPSISSEWA 

In yonder forest gloom where folds 

A leafy dark upon a dark, 
Pipsissewa her torch upholds 

And by its little gleaming spark 
I see the shyest denizen 
That in the woodland hides from men. 

And seen thereby, I can descry 
The sweet alarm of fairy folk 

Affrightened by a vagrant sigh 
That in the pine tree music woke; 

Fretted I would hush this breeze 

Startling such timid sprites as these. 

For who would not save such from fear, 
Those who look with hesitating eyes 

Upon this strange man-haunted sphere? 
Would that I could myself disguise 

And with elfin wings be made a fay, 

Fore'er with fays a friend to stay. 



277 



THE BLUEBELL 

A Bluebell caught a raindrop 
And held it to her breast, 

A stranger from the skyland 
'Twas happy there to rest. 

But butterflies were thirsty 
And scenting a new brew, 

They fell upon the bluebell 
And drank the raindrop dew. 

It was a startled Bluebell 
Who drooped in her surprise. 

When robbed of her one treasure. 
By wayward butterflies. 



278 



THE TULIP 

Impatient for her fair fulfilment, 

A tulip bursts her prison bars, 
Escaping earth to scan the heavens. 

And watch the slowly fading stars. 

Her curling wings are kin to sunshine. 
Her simple heart is true as gold : 

She looks about to find her fellows, 
To see who else has dared the cold. 

A crocus comes, then shy arbutus, 

Adventurous, white-lipped, half numb, 

They tell her they have followed, bidding 
Their trembling sisters soon to come. 

And as they call, wee heads are peering 
Where withered leaf with green inweaves, 

Each saying to the other, ** Hurry, 

Lest Spring our gladdest hope deceives." 



279 



THE SOUTH WIND TO THE VIOLET 

Sad-hued as purpling twilight 

In waiting perfect sleep, 
The violet binds her petals 

A fold on fold to keep. 

To keep till I, caressing 

Kiss the perfumed wings apart, 

While whispering I ask her, 
To be my true Sweetheart. 

Her answering sigh is tender, 

A breath so faint and low 
You hear it not, I guess it 

From her blue eyes' newborn glow. 



280 



DANDELIONS 

I saw a nearby golden light, 

Starring the shadowless soft green, 

The green where Spring's first smile is seen; 

It seemed a sunray lost in flight 
Or else a sleeping butterfly, 
A yellow bird there left to die. 

Then with the shining prize in sight, 
I followed with the gentlest tread — 
Went nearer, nearer to the bed 

Shimmering with the golden light; 
I followed there to find afield 
But gleaming dandelions revealed. 



281 



MAY AND THE LILY-OF-THE-VALLEY 

There is a maiden gentle, free, 

A rose fleck missed her paling cheek, 

Her robe is all of virgin white, 
Her voice is melting, low and meek. 

And slipping down her body falls 
Her waving hair worn, proudly, so. 

It clings and keeps her close and shades 
Her heaven-blue eyes, their unspent glow. 

This maiden free, not knowing shame, 
Her heart and love on me bestows. 

Unasked, unkissed, she kisses me 
When the moon is glad and star-light glows. 

And I my frozen heart awakes. 

Her scented lips laid sweet on mine, 

And thus I learn, though cycles old, 
The secret of a love divine. 



283 



THE JUNE DAY ROSEBUD 

Enchanted by a June-day rosebud, 
Too long a dew-drop kissed its cheek 

And stealthily a south wind blowing 
Drove it away in jealous pique. 

The South Wind coveted this blossom 
And (wonted to her loveliness), 

He bore her to his far-off homeland. 
There held her slave in tenderness. 

But, sick for earth and warm moss-bedding 
The grieving rosebud paled too soon 

And, weeping soft, she cried her eyes out, 
Was buried with the dying moon. 



283 



THE WATER LILY 

Delayed by hushing wings of night, 
The stream lies languid in the pool, 

And buried there is Day's Delight, — 
The water lily, calm and cool. 

And, lest a frightened wind arise 
To spoil this still and lonely grave,- 

Strong watchers wake in silent guise, - 
The sedges that encircling save. 



384 



PANSIES 

Dear pansies give sweet greeting, 

To unfamiliar spring. 
They tell of clans, in meeting — 

Of secret happening. 

They tell that once, in stealing, 
They stole a sunbeam's ray, 

And hid it far, concealing 
Its glow from mourning Day. 

So tell of tricks in playtime 
When the yellow in their eyes 

Changed purple in the daytime, 
Dame April to surprise. 

Such little sober faces. 
And yet so full of guile, 

Just one with gentle graces 
And disingenuous smile. 

This one to me revealing 
These secrets long untold. 

Is shamed, so shame concealing 
Returned to earth's safe fold. 



285 



WHEN ROSES BLOOM 

When June days beckon, roses plead, 
Then I am vanquished, for I know 

That I must follow where they lead, 
Follow, or else heart's heaven forego. 



286 



CHERRY BLOSSOMS 

Lily-white; 

Heart's delight, 
A-tremble if the winds blow wild, 

Will you fly 

Heavenward high, 
If winds a-blowing, blow more wild? 

Lily-white 

Heart's delight, 
To Love's sweet music will you sing? 

Will you fall 

At my call, 
And kiss me with the breath of Spring? 



287 



EARLY ARBUTUS 

Oh ! child of earth 
Glad I love you, love you so, 

I would hold the day all still, 
So to keep you where you grow: 

Your scented breath I would distill 
To keep its fragrance ever new, 

Thus I love you, only you. 

Oh! child of earth 
Spirit of the dreaming wood. 

Near the laughing water you: 
I would charm you if I could, 

Hold you to my breast so true 
Keep your sweetness, sweet alone, 

'Gainst my heart, my very own. 



288 



ROSES 

With lavish hand June scatters roses; — 
The rose with tender cheeks aflame, 
The tattered rose who pales with shame, 

The rose whose heart pure gold discloses. 
With rose whose flushing vies with morn, 
The snow-white rose who hides her thorn. 

This queenly rose July deposes, 

Her petals in swift drooping spread, 

The lily reigning in her stead. 
Her Kingdom ravished," June reposes 

Just where the white rose laid her head, 

The rose of all the roses dead. 



X9 



PUSSY WILLOWS 

Like slim grey hands of time are they, 
Pointing the way to range and change : 
From approaching skies so warm and strange 

In languishing they stray away, 
Swift to follow fading spring. 
Dying when early robins sing. 



290 



THE DAFFODIL AND THE BEE 

Down in the grass, a daffodil 
And basking in her smile, a bee, 

Each with a mission to fulfil ; 

The daffodil her dew to spill, 
The bee to drink it thirstily 

And therefrom nectar to distill. 

Oh! greedy bee and daffodil, 

Felicitous your destiny. 
The golden dew on earth to spill, 
Or golden nectar to distill 

As sun-gods sip it thirstily, 
Ere shadows their dark fate fulfil. 



291 



THE PRIMROSE 

April will you call me, 
Touch me and enthrall me 

Of all the roses first? 
Show me once your treasures, 
Tell me of the pleasures 

By springtime last rehearsed. 

Tell me how to fashion, 
Smiles from out of passion, 

So tell me true and now. 
Then, will I tell you after, 
Why you fashion laughter 

From tears, tell true and how. 



29* 



FOR LOVE IT GREW 

In ravishing the earth for bloom, 
Its every garden searching through, 

I find one rose that lights the gloom 
As glowing red for Love it grew. 



293 



ROSE OF THE GLAD TIME 

Oh ! Rose of the glad time, 

Oh! Rose of the earth, 
Long men have sought you 

Sought you in birth, 
Your leaf then in bud time 

When pink in first flush : 
Men fought for, then sought you 

Though your heart beats a-hush. 

True Love never faltered, 

(Life's way up or down) 
Though your cheeks to pale altered, 

Your dress turned to brown, 
He sought you to dare you, 

And with time fleet of wing, 
He sought you to snare you, 

Earth's one precious thing. 



294 



